what is a textual analysis essay

Textual Analysis: Definition, Types & 10 Examples

Textual analysis is a research methodology that involves exploring written text as empirical data. Scholars explore both the content and structure of texts, and attempt to discern key themes and statistics emergent from them.

This method of research is used in various academic disciplines, including cultural studies, literature, bilical studies, anthropology , sociology, and others (Dearing, 2022; McKee, 2003).

This method of analysis involves breaking down a text into its constituent parts for close reading and making inferences about its context, underlying themes, and the intentions of its author.

Textual Analysis Definition

Alan McKee is one of the preeminent scholars of textual analysis. He provides a clear and approachable definition in his book Textual Analysis: A Beginner’s Guide (2003) where he writes:

“When we perform textual analysis on a text we make an educated guess at some of the most likely interpretations that might be made of the text […] in order to try and obtain a sense of the ways in which, in particular cultures at particular times, people make sense of the world around them.”

A key insight worth extracting from this definition is that textual analysis can reveal what cultural groups value, how they create meaning, and how they interpret reality.

This is invaluable in situations where scholars are seeking to more deeply understand cultural groups and civilizations – both past and present (Metoyer et al., 2018).

As such, it may be beneficial for a range of different types of studies, such as:

• Studies of Historical Texts: A study of how certain concepts are framed, described, and approached in historical texts, such as the Bible.
• Studies of Industry Reports: A study of how industry reports frame and discuss concepts such as environmental and social responsibility.
• Studies of Literature: A study of how a particular text or group of texts within a genre define and frame concepts. For example, you could explore how great American literature mythologizes the concept of the ‘The American Dream’.
• Studies of Speeches: A study of how certain politicians position national identities in their appeals for votes.
• Studies of Newspapers: A study of the biases within newspapers toward or against certain groups of people.
• Etc. (For more, see: Dearing, 2022)

McKee uses the term ‘textual analysis’ to also refer to text types that are not just written, but multimodal. For a dive into the analysis of multimodal texts, I recommend my article on content analysis , where I explore the study of texts like television advertisements and movies in detail.

Features of a Textual Analysis

When conducting a textual analysis, you’ll need to consider a range of factors within the text that are worthy of close examination to infer meaning. Features worthy of considering include:

• Content: What is being said or conveyed in the text, including explicit and implicit meanings, themes, or ideas.
• Context: When and where the text was created, the culture and society it reflects, and the circumstances surrounding its creation and distribution.
• Audience: Who the text is intended for, how it’s received, and the effect it has on its audience.
• Authorship: Who created the text, their background and perspectives, and how these might influence the text.
• Form and structure: The layout, sequence, and organization of the text and how these elements contribute to its meanings (Metoyer et al., 2018).

Textual Analysis Coding Methods

The above features may be examined through quantitative or qualitative research designs , or a mixed-methods angle.

1. Quantitative Approaches

You could analyze several of the above features, namely, content, form, and structure, from a quantitative perspective using computational linguistics and natural language processing (NLP) analysis.

From this approach, you would use algorithms to extract useful information or insights about frequency of word and phrase usage, etc. This can include techniques like sentiment analysis, topic modeling, named entity recognition, and more.

2. Qualitative Approaches

In many ways, textual analysis lends itself best to qualitative analysis. When identifying words and phrases, you’re also going to want to look at the surrounding context and possibly cultural interpretations of what is going on (Mayring, 2015).

Generally, humans are far more perceptive at teasing out these contextual factors than machines (although, AI is giving us a run for our money).

One qualitative approach to textual analysis that I regularly use is inductive coding, a step-by-step methodology that can help you extract themes from texts. If you’re interested in using this step-by-step method, read my guide on inductive coding here .

See more Qualitative Research Approaches Here

Textual Analysis Examples

Title: “Discourses on Gender, Patriarchy and Resolution 1325: A Textual Analysis of UN Documents”  Author: Nadine Puechguirbal Year: 2010 APA Citation: Puechguirbal, N. (2010). Discourses on Gender, Patriarchy and Resolution 1325: A Textual Analysis of UN Documents, International Peacekeeping, 17 (2): 172-187. doi: 10.1080/13533311003625068

Summary: The article discusses the language used in UN documents related to peace operations and analyzes how it perpetuates stereotypical portrayals of women as vulnerable individuals. The author argues that this language removes women’s agency and keeps them in a subordinate position as victims, instead of recognizing them as active participants and agents of change in post-conflict environments. Despite the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325, which aims to address the role of women in peace and security, the author suggests that the UN’s male-dominated power structure remains unchallenged, and gender mainstreaming is often presented as a non-political activity.

Title: “Racism and the Media: A Textual Analysis”  Author: Kassia E. Kulaszewicz Year: 2015 APA Citation: Kulaszewicz, K. E. (2015). Racism and the Media: A Textual Analysis . Dissertation. Retrieved from: https://sophia.stkate.edu/msw_papers/477

Summary: This study delves into the significant role media plays in fostering explicit racial bias. Using Bandura’s Learning Theory, it investigates how media content influences our beliefs through ‘observational learning’. Conducting a textual analysis, it finds differences in representation of black and white people, stereotyping of black people, and ostensibly micro-aggressions toward black people. The research highlights how media often criminalizes Black men, portraying them as violent, while justifying or supporting the actions of White officers, regardless of their potential criminality. The study concludes that news media likely continues to reinforce racism, whether consciously or unconsciously.

Title: “On the metaphorical nature of intellectual capital: a textual analysis” Author: Daniel Andriessen Year: 2006 APA Citation: Andriessen, D. (2006). On the metaphorical nature of intellectual capital: a textual analysis. Journal of Intellectual capital , 7 (1), 93-110.

Summary: This article delves into the metaphorical underpinnings of intellectual capital (IC) and knowledge management, examining how knowledge is conceptualized through metaphors. The researchers employed a textual analysis methodology, scrutinizing key texts in the field to identify prevalent metaphors. They found that over 95% of statements about knowledge are metaphor-based, with “knowledge as a resource” and “knowledge as capital” being the most dominant. This study demonstrates how textual analysis helps us to understand current understandings and ways of speaking about a topic.

Title: “Race in Rhetoric: A Textual Analysis of Barack Obama’s Campaign Discourse Regarding His Race” Author: Andrea Dawn Andrews Year: 2011 APA Citation: Andrew, A. D. (2011) Race in Rhetoric: A Textual Analysis of Barack Obama’s Campaign Discourse Regarding His Race. Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection. 120 . https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/ugtheses/120

This undergraduate honors thesis is a textual analysis of Barack Obama’s speeches that explores how Obama frames the concept of race. The student’s capstone project found that Obama tended to frame racial inequality as something that could be overcome, and that this was a positive and uplifting project. Here, the student breaks-down times when Obama utilizes the concept of race in his speeches, and examines the surrounding content to see the connotations associated with race and race-relations embedded in the text. Here, we see a decidedly qualitative approach to textual analysis which can deliver contextualized and in-depth insights.

Sub-Types of Textual Analysis

While above I have focused on a generalized textual analysis approach, a range of sub-types and offshoots have emerged that focus on specific concepts, often within their own specific theoretical paradigms. Each are outlined below, and where I’ve got a guide, I’ve linked to it in blue:

• Content Analysis : Content analysis is similar to textual analysis, and I would consider it a type of textual analysis, where it’s got a broader understanding of the term ‘text’. In this type, a text is any type of ‘content’, and could be multimodal in nature, such as television advertisements, movies, posters, and so forth. Content analysis can be both qualitative and quantitative, depending on whether it focuses more on the meaning of the content or the frequency of certain words or concepts (Chung & Pennebaker, 2018).
• Discourse Analysis : Emergent specifically from critical and postmodern/ poststructural theories, discourse analysis focuses closely on the use of language within a social context, with the goal of revealing how repeated framing of terms and concepts has the effect of shaping how cultures understand social categories. It considers how texts interact with and shape social norms, power dynamics, ideologies, etc. For example, it might examine how gender is socially constructed as a distinct social category through Disney films. It may also be called ‘critical discourse analysis’.
• Narrative Analysis: This approach is used for analyzing stories and narratives within text. It looks at elements like plot, characters, themes, and the sequence of events to understand how narratives construct meaning.
• Frame Analysis: This approach looks at how events, ideas, and themes are presented or “framed” within a text. It explores how these frames can shape our understanding of the information being presented. While similar to discourse analysis, a frame analysis tends to be less associated with the loaded concept of ‘discourse’ that exists specifically within postmodern paradigms (Smith, 2017).
• Semiotic Analysis: This approach studies signs and symbols, both visual and textual, and could be a good compliment to a content analysis, as it provides the language and understandings necessary to describe how signs make meaning in cultural contexts that we might find with the fields of semantics and pragmatics . It’s based on the theory of semiotics, which is concerned with how meaning is created and communicated through signs and symbols.
• Computational Textual Analysis: In the context of data science or artificial intelligence, this type of analysis involves using algorithms to process large amounts of text. Techniques can include topic modeling, sentiment analysis, word frequency analysis, and others. While being extremely useful for a quantitative analysis of a large dataset of text, it falls short in its ability to provide deep contextualized understandings of words-in-context.

Each of these methods has its strengths and weaknesses, and the choice of method depends on the research question, the type of text being analyzed, and the broader context of the research.

See More Examples of Analysis Here

Strengths and Weaknesses of Textual Analysis

When writing your methodology for your textual analysis, make sure to define not only what textual analysis is, but (if applicable) the type of textual analysis, the features of the text you’re analyzing, and the ways you will code the data. It’s also worth actively reflecting on the potential weaknesses of a textual analysis approach, but also explaining why, despite those weaknesses, you believe this to be the most appropriate methodology for your study.

Chung, C. K., & Pennebaker, J. W. (2018). Textual analysis. In  Measurement in social psychology  (pp. 153-173). Routledge.

Dearing, V. A. (2022).  Manual of textual analysis . Univ of California Press.

McKee, A. (2003). Textual analysis: A beginner’s guide.  Textual analysis , 1-160.

Mayring, P. (2015). Qualitative content analysis: Theoretical background and procedures.  Approaches to qualitative research in mathematics education: Examples of methodology and methods , 365-380. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9181-6_13

Metoyer, R., Zhi, Q., Janczuk, B., & Scheirer, W. (2018, March). Coupling story to visualization: Using textual analysis as a bridge between data and interpretation. In  23rd International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces  (pp. 503-507). doi: https://doi.org/10.1145/3172944.3173007

Smith, J. A. (2017). Textual analysis.  The international encyclopedia of communication research methods , 1-7.

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

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Home » Textual Analysis – Types, Examples and Guide

Textual Analysis – Types, Examples and Guide

Table of Contents

Textual Analysis

Textual analysis is the process of examining a text in order to understand its meaning. It can be used to analyze any type of text, including literature , poetry, speeches, and scientific papers. Textual analysis involves analyzing the structure, content, and style of a text.

Textual analysis can be used to understand a text’s author, date, and audience. It can also reveal how a text was constructed and how it functions as a piece of communication.

Textual Analysis in Research

Textual analysis is a valuable tool in research because it allows researchers to examine and interpret text data in a systematic and rigorous way. Here are some ways that textual analysis can be used in research:

• To explore research questions: Textual analysis can be used to explore research questions in various fields, such as literature, media studies, and social sciences. It can provide insight into the meaning, interpretation, and communication patterns of text.
• To identify patterns and themes: Textual analysis can help identify patterns and themes within a set of text data, such as analyzing the representation of gender or race in media.
• To evaluate interventions: Textual analysis can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions, such as analyzing the language and messaging of public health campaigns.
• To inform policy and practice: Textual analysis can provide insights that inform policy and practice, such as analyzing legal documents to inform policy decisions.
• To analyze historical data: Textual analysis can be used to analyze historical data, such as letters, diaries, and newspapers, to provide insights into historical events and social contexts.

Textual Analysis in Cultural and Media Studies

Textual analysis is a key tool in cultural and media studies as it enables researchers to analyze the meanings, representations, and discourses present in cultural and media texts. Here are some ways that textual analysis is used in cultural and media studies:

• To analyze representation: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the representation of different social groups, such as gender, race, and sexuality, in media and cultural texts. This analysis can provide insights into how these groups are constructed and represented in society.
• To analyze cultural meanings: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the cultural meanings and symbols present in media and cultural texts. This analysis can provide insights into how culture and society are constructed and understood.
• To analyze discourse: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the discourse present in cultural and media texts. This analysis can provide insights into how language is used to construct meaning and power relations.
• To analyze media content: Textual analysis can be used to analyze media content, such as news articles, TV shows, and films, to understand how they shape our understanding of the world around us.
• To analyze advertising : Textual analysis can be used to analyze advertising campaigns to understand how they construct meanings, identities, and desires.

Textual Analysis in the Social Sciences

Textual analysis is a valuable tool in the social sciences as it enables researchers to analyze and interpret text data in a systematic and rigorous way. Here are some ways that textual analysis is used in the social sciences:

• To analyze interview data: Textual analysis can be used to analyze interview data, such as transcribed interviews, to identify patterns and themes in the data.
• To analyze survey responses: Textual analysis can be used to analyze survey responses to identify patterns and themes in the data.
• To analyze social media data: Textual analysis can be used to analyze social media data, such as tweets and Facebook posts, to identify patterns and themes in the data.
• To analyze policy documents: Textual analysis can be used to analyze policy documents, such as government reports and legislation, to identify discourses and power relations present in the policy.
• To analyze historical data: Textual analysis can be used to analyze historical data, such as letters and diaries, to provide insights into historical events and social contexts.

Textual Analysis in Literary Studies

Textual analysis is a key tool in literary studies as it enables researchers to analyze and interpret literary texts in a systematic and rigorous way. Here are some ways that textual analysis is used in literary studies:

• To analyze narrative structure: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the narrative structure of a literary text, such as identifying the plot, character development, and point of view.
• To analyze language and style: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the language and style used in a literary text, such as identifying figurative language, symbolism, and rhetorical devices.
• To analyze themes and motifs: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the themes and motifs present in a literary text, such as identifying recurring symbols, themes, and motifs.
• To analyze historical and cultural context: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the historical and cultural context of a literary text, such as identifying how the text reflects the social and political context of its time.
• To analyze intertextuality: Textual analysis can be used to analyze the intertextuality of a literary text, such as identifying how the text references or is influenced by other literary works.

Textual Analysis Methods

Textual analysis methods are techniques used to analyze and interpret various types of text, including written documents, audio and video recordings, and online content. These methods are commonly used in fields such as linguistics, communication studies, sociology, psychology, and literature.

Some common textual analysis methods include:

Content Analysis

This involves identifying patterns and themes within a set of text data. This method is often used to analyze media content or other types of written materials, such as policy documents or legal briefs.

Discourse Analysis

This involves examining how language is used to construct meaning in social contexts. This method is often used to analyze political speeches or other types of public discourse.

Critical Discourse Analysis

This involves examining how power and social relations are constructed through language use, particularly in political and social contexts.

Narrative Analysis

This involves examining the structure and content of stories or narratives within a set of text data. This method is often used to analyze literary texts or oral histories.

This involves analyzing the meaning of signs and symbols within a set of text data. This method is often used to analyze advertising or other types of visual media.

Text mining

This involves using computational techniques to extract patterns and insights from large sets of text data. This method is often used in fields such as marketing and social media analysis.

Close Reading

This involves a detailed and in-depth analysis of a particular text, focusing on the language, style, and literary techniques used by the author.

How to Conduct Textual Analysis

Here are some general steps to conduct textual analysis:

• Choose your research question: Define your research question and identify the text or set of texts that you want to analyze.
• F amiliarize yourself with the text: Read and re-read the text, paying close attention to its language, structure, and content. Take notes on key themes, patterns, and ideas that emerge.
• Choose your analytical approach: Select the appropriate analytical approach for your research question, such as close reading, thematic analysis, content analysis, or discourse analysis.
• Create a coding scheme: If you are conducting content analysis, create a coding scheme to categorize and analyze the content of the text. This may involve identifying specific words, themes, or ideas to code.
• Code the text: Apply your coding scheme to the text and systematically categorize the content based on the identified themes or patterns.
• Analyze the data: Once you have coded the text, analyze the data to identify key patterns, themes, or trends. Use appropriate software or tools to help with this process if needed.
• Draw conclusions: Draw conclusions based on your analysis and answer your research question. Present your findings and provide evidence to support your conclusions.
• R eflect on limitations and implications: Reflect on the limitations of your analysis, such as any biases or limitations of the selected method. Also, discuss the implications of your findings and their relevance to the broader research field.

When to use Textual Analysis

Textual analysis can be used in various research fields and contexts. Here are some situations when textual analysis can be useful:

• Understanding meaning and interpretation: Textual analysis can help understand the meaning and interpretation of text, such as literature, media, and social media.
• Analyzing communication patterns: Textual analysis can be used to analyze communication patterns in different contexts, such as political speeches, social media conversations, and legal documents.
• Exploring cultural and social contexts: Textual analysis can be used to explore cultural and social contexts, such as the representation of gender, race, and identity in media.
• Examining historical documents: Textual analysis can be used to examine historical documents, such as letters, diaries, and newspapers.
• Evaluating marketing and advertising campaigns: Textual analysis can be used to evaluate marketing and advertising campaigns, such as analyzing the language, symbols, and imagery used.

Examples of Textual Analysis

Here are a few examples:

• Media Analysis: Textual analysis is frequently used in media studies to examine how news outlets and social media platforms frame and present news stories. Researchers can use textual analysis to examine the language and images used in news articles, tweets, and other forms of media to identify patterns and biases.
• Customer Feedback Analysis: Textual analysis is often used by businesses to analyze customer feedback, such as online reviews or social media posts, to identify common themes and areas for improvement. This allows companies to make data-driven decisions and improve their products or services.
• Political Discourse Analysis: Textual analysis is commonly used in political science to analyze political speeches, debates, and other forms of political communication. Researchers can use this method to identify the language and rhetoric used by politicians, as well as the strategies they employ to appeal to different audiences.
• Literary Analysis: Textual analysis is a fundamental tool in literary criticism, allowing scholars to examine the language, structure, and themes of literary works. This can involve close reading of individual texts or analysis of larger literary movements.
• Sentiment Analysis: Textual analysis is used to analyze social media posts, customer feedback, or other sources of text data to determine the sentiment of the text. This can be useful for businesses or organizations to understand how their brand or product is perceived in the market.

Purpose of Textual Analysis

There are several specific purposes for using textual analysis, including:

• To identify and interpret patterns in language use: Textual analysis can help researchers identify patterns in language use, such as common themes, recurring phrases, and rhetorical devices. This can provide insights into the values and beliefs that underpin the text.
• To explore the cultural context of the text: Textual analysis can help researchers understand the cultural context in which the text was produced, including the historical, social, and political factors that shaped the language and messages.
• To examine the intended and unintended meanings of the text: Textual analysis can help researchers uncover both the intended and unintended meanings of the text, and to explore how the language is used to convey certain messages or values.
• To understand how texts create and reinforce social and cultural identities: Textual analysis can help researchers understand how texts contribute to the creation and reinforcement of social and cultural identities, such as gender, race, ethnicity, and nationality.

Applications of Textual Analysis

Here are some common applications of textual analysis:

Media Studies

Textual analysis is frequently used in media studies to analyze news articles, advertisements, and social media posts to identify patterns and biases in media representation.

Literary Criticism

Textual analysis is a fundamental tool in literary criticism, allowing scholars to examine the language, structure, and themes of literary works.

Political Science

Textual analysis is commonly used in political science to analyze political speeches, debates, and other forms of political communication.

Marketing and Consumer Research

Textual analysis is used to analyze customer feedback, such as online reviews or social media posts, to identify common themes and areas for improvement.

Healthcare Research

Textual analysis is used to analyze patient feedback and medical records to identify patterns in patient experiences and improve healthcare services.

Social Sciences

Textual analysis is used in various fields within social sciences, such as sociology, anthropology, and psychology, to analyze various forms of data, including interviews, field notes, and documents.

Linguistics

Textual analysis is used in linguistics to study language use and its relationship to social and cultural contexts.

Advantages of Textual Analysis

There are several advantages of textual analysis in research. Here are some of the key advantages:

• Systematic and objective: Textual analysis is a systematic and objective method of analyzing text data. It enables researchers to analyze text data in a consistent and rigorous way, minimizing the risk of bias or subjectivity.
• Versatile : Textual analysis can be used to analyze a wide range of text data, including interview transcripts, survey responses, social media data, policy documents, and literary texts.
• Efficient : Textual analysis can be a more efficient method of data analysis compared to manual coding or other methods of qualitative analysis. With the help of software tools, researchers can process large volumes of text data more quickly and accurately.
• Allows for in-depth analysis: Textual analysis enables researchers to conduct in-depth analysis of text data, uncovering patterns and themes that may not be visible through other methods of data analysis.
• Can provide rich insights: Textual analysis can provide rich and detailed insights into complex social phenomena. It can uncover subtle nuances in language use, reveal underlying meanings and discourses, and shed light on the ways in which social structures and power relations are constructed and maintained.

Limitations of Textual Analysis

While textual analysis can provide valuable insights into the ways in which language is used to convey meaning and create social and cultural identities, it also has several limitations. Some of these limitations include:

• Limited Scope : Textual analysis is only able to analyze the content of written or spoken language, and does not provide insights into non-verbal communication such as facial expressions or body language.
• Subjectivity: Textual analysis is subject to the biases and interpretations of the researcher, as well as the context in which the language was produced. Different researchers may interpret the same text in different ways, leading to inconsistencies in the findings.
• Time-consuming: Textual analysis can be a time-consuming process, particularly if the researcher is analyzing a large amount of text. This can be a limitation in situations where quick analysis is necessary.
• Lack of Generalizability: Textual analysis is often used in qualitative research, which means that its findings cannot be generalized to larger populations. This limits the ability to draw conclusions that are applicable to a wider range of contexts.
• Limited Accessibility: Textual analysis requires specialized skills and training, which may limit its accessibility to researchers who are not trained in this method.

About the author

Muhammad Hassan

Researcher, Academic Writer, Web developer

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The Practical Guide to Textual Analysis

• Getting Started
• How Does It Work?
• Use Cases & Applications

Textual analysis is the process of gathering and examining qualitative data to understand what it’s about.

But making sense of qualitative information is a major challenge. Whether analyzing data in business or performing academic research, manually reading, analyzing, and tagging text is no longer effective – it’s time-consuming, results are often inaccurate, and the process far from scalable.

Fortunately, developments in the sub-fields of Artificial Intelligence (AI) like machine learning and natural language processing (NLP) are creating unprecedented opportunities to process and analyze large collections of text data.

Thanks to algorithms trained with machine learning it is possible to perform a myriad of tasks that involve analyzing text, like topic classification (automatically tagging texts by topic), feature extraction (identifying specific characteristics in a text) and sentiment analysis (recognizing the emotions that underlie a given text).

Below, we’ll dive into textual analysis with machine learning, what it is and how it works, and reveal its most important applications in business and academic research:

Getting started with textual analysis

• What is textual analysis?
• Difference between textual analysis and content analysis?
• What is computer-assisted textual analysis?
• Methods and techniques
• Why is it important?

How does textual analysis work?

• Text classification
• Text extraction

Use cases and applications

• Customer service
• Customer feedback
• Academic research

Let’s start with the basics!

Getting Started With Textual Analysis

What is textual analysis.

While similar to text analysis , textual analysis is mainly used in academic research to analyze content related to media and communication studies, popular culture, sociology, and philosophy.

In this case, the purpose of textual analysis is to understand the cultural and ideological aspects that underlie a text and how they are connected with the particular context in which the text has been produced. In short, textual analysis consists of describing the characteristics of a text and making interpretations to answer specific questions.

One of the challenges of textual analysis resides in how to turn complex, large-scale data into manageable information. Computer-assisted textual analysis can be instrumental at this point, as it allows you to perform certain tasks automatically (without having to read all the data) and makes it simple to observe patterns and get unexpected insights. For example, you could perform automated textual analysis on a large set of data and easily tag all the information according to a series of previously defined categories. You could also use it to extract specific pieces of data, like names, countries, emails, or any other features.

Companies are using computer-assisted textual analysis to make sense of unstructured business data , and find relevant insights that lead to data-driven decisions. It’s being used to automate everyday tasks like ticket tagging and routing, improving productivity, and saving valuable time.

Difference Between Textual Analysis and Content Analysis?

When we talk about textual analysis we refer to a data-gathering process for analyzing text data. This qualitative methodology examines the structure, content, and meaning of a text, and how it relates to the historical and cultural context in which it was produced. To do so, textual analysis combines knowledge from different disciplines, like linguistics and semiotics.

Content analysis can be considered a subcategory of textual analysis, which intends to systematically analyze text, by coding the elements of the text to get quantitative insights. By coding text (that is, establishing different categories for the analysis), content analysis makes it possible to examine large sets of data and make replicable and valid inferences.

Sitting at the intersection between qualitative and quantitative approaches, content analysis has proved to be very useful to study a wide array of text data ― from newspaper articles to social media messages ― within many different fields, that range from academic research to organizational or business studies.

What is Computer-Assisted Textual Analysis?

Computer-assisted textual analysis involves using a software, digital platform, or computational tools to perform tasks related to text analysis automatically.

The developments in machine learning make it possible to create algorithms that can be trained with examples and learn a series of tasks, from identifying topics on a given text to extracting relevant information from an extensive collection of data. Natural Language Processing (NLP), another sub-field of AI, helps machines process unstructured data and transform it into manageable information that’s ready to analyze.

Automated textual analysis enables you to analyze large amounts of data that would require a significant amount of time and resources if done manually. Not only is automated textual analysis fast and straightforward, but it’s also scalable and provides consistent results.

Let’s look at an example. During the US elections 2016, we used MonkeyLearn to analyze millions of tweets referring to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton . A text classification model allowed us to tag each Tweet into the two predefined categories: Trump and Hillary. The results showed that, on an average day, Donald Trump was getting around 450,000 Twitter mentions while Hillary Clinton was only getting about 250,000. And that was just the tip of the iceberg! What was really interesting was the nuances of those mentions: were they favorable or unfavorable? By performing sentiment analysis , we were able to discover the feelings behind those messages and gain some interesting insights about the polarity of those opinions.

For example, this is how Trump’s Tweets looked like when counted by sentiment:

And this graphic shows the same for Hillary Clinton:

There are many methods and techniques for automated textual analysis. In the following section, we’ll take a closer look at each of them so that you have a better idea of what you can do with computer-assisted textual analysis.

Textual Analysis Methods & Techniques

• Word frequency

Collocation

Concordance, basic methods, word frequency.

Word frequency helps you find the most recurrent terms or expressions within a set of data. Counting the times a word is mentioned in a group of texts can lead you to interesting insights, for example, when analyzing customer feedback responses. If the terms ‘hard to use’ or ‘complex’ often appear in comments about your product, it may indicate you need to make UI/UX adjustments.

By ‘collocation’ we mean a sequence of words that frequently occur together. Collocations are usually bigrams (a pair of words) and trigrams (a combination of three words). ‘Average salary’ , ‘global market’ , ‘close a deal’ , ‘make an appointment’ , ‘attend a meeting’ are examples of collocations related to business.

In textual analysis, identifying collocations is useful to understand the semantic structure of a text. Counting bigrams and trigrams as one word improves the accuracy of the analysis.

Human language is ambiguous: depending on the context, the same word can mean different things. Concordance is used to identify instances in which a word or a series of words appear, to understand its exact meaning. For example, here are a few sentences from product reviews containing the word ‘time’:

Advanced Methods

Text classification.

Text classification is the process of assigning tags or categories to unstructured data based on its content.

When we talk about unstructured data we refer to all sorts of text-based information that is unorganized, and therefore complex to sort and manage. For businesses, unstructured data may include emails, social media posts, chats, online reviews, support tickets, among many others. Text classification ― one of the essential tasks of Natural Language Processing (NLP) ― makes it possible to analyze text in a simple and cost-efficient way, organizing the data according to topic, urgency, sentiment or intent. We’ll take a closer look at each of these applications below:

Topic Analysis consists of assigning predefined tags to an extensive collection of text data, based on its topics or themes. Let’s say you want to analyze a series of product reviews to understand what aspects of your product are being discussed, and a review reads ‘the customer service is very responsive, they are always ready to help’ . This piece of feedback will be tagged under the topic ‘Customer Service’ .

Sentiment Analysis , also known as ‘opinion mining’, is the automated process of understanding the attributes of an opinion, that is, the emotions that underlie a text (e.g. positive, negative, and neutral). Sentiment analysis provides exciting opportunities in all kinds of fields. In business, you can use it to analyze customer feedback, social media posts, emails, support tickets, and chats. For instance, you could analyze support tickets to identify angry customers and solve their issues as a priority. You may also combine topic analysis with sentiment analysis (it is called aspect-based sentiment analysis ) to identify the topics being discussed about your product, and also, how people are reacting towards those topics. For example, take the product review we mentioned earlier for topic analysis: ‘the customer service is very responsive, they are always ready to help’ . This statement would be classified as both Positive and Customer Service .

Language detection : this allows you to classify a text based on its language. It’s particularly useful for routing purposes. For example, if you get a support ticket in Spanish, it could be automatically routed to a Spanish-speaking customer support team.

Intent detection : text classifiers can also be used to recognize the intent of a given text. What is the purpose behind a specific message? This can be helpful if you need to analyze customer support conversations or the results of a sales email campaign. For example, you could analyze email responses and classify your prospects based on their level of interest in your product.

Text Extraction

Text extraction is a textual analysis technique which consists of extracting specific terms or expressions from a collection of text data. Unlike text classification, the result is not a predefined tag but a piece of information that is already present in the text. For example, if you have a large collection of emails to analyze, you could easily pull out specific information such as email addresses, company names or any keyword that you need to retrieve. In some cases, you can combine text classification and text extraction in the same analysis.

The most useful text extraction tasks include:

Named-entity recognition : used to extract the names of companies , people , or organizations from a set of data.

Keyword extraction : allows you to extract the most relevant terms within a text. You can use keyword extraction to index data to be searched, create tags clouds, summarize the content of a text, among many other things.

Feature extraction : used to identify specific characteristics within a text. For example, if you are analyzing a series of product descriptions, you could create customized extractors to retrieve information like brand, model, color, etc .

Why is Textual Analysis Important?

Every day, we create a colossal amount of digital data. In fact, in the last two years alone we generated 90% percent of all the data in the world . That includes social media messages, emails, Google searches, and every other source of online data.

At the same time, books, media libraries, reports, and other types of databases are now available in digital format, providing researchers of all disciplines opportunities that didn’t exist before.

But the problem is that most of this data is unstructured. Since it doesn’t follow any organizational criteria, unstructured text is hard to search, manage, and examine. In this scenario, automated textual analysis tools are essential, as they help make sense of text data and find meaningful insights in a sea of information.

Text analysis enables businesses to go through massive collections of data with minimum human effort, saving precious time and resources, and allowing people to focus on areas where they can add more value. Here are some of the advantages of automated textual analysis:

Scalability

You can analyze as much data as you need in just seconds. Not only will you save valuable time, but you’ll also make your teams much more productive.

Real-time analysis

For businesses, it is key to detect angry customers on time or be warned of a potential PR crisis. By creating customized machine learning models for text analysis, you can easily monitor chats, reviews, social media channels, support tickets and all sorts of crucial data sources in real time, so you’re ready to take action when needed.

Academic researchers, especially in the political science field , may find real-time analysis with machine learning particularly useful to analyze polls, Twitter data, and election results.

Consistent criteria

Routine manual tasks (like tagging incoming tickets or processing customer feedback, for example) often end up being tedious and time-consuming. There are more chances of making mistakes and the criteria applied within team members often turns out to be inconsistent and subjective. Machine learning algorithms, on the other hand, learn from previous examples and always use the same criteria to analyze data .

How does Textual Analysis Work?

Computer-assisted textual analysis makes it easy to analyze large collections of text data and find meaningful information. Thanks to machine learning, it is possible to create models that learn from examples and can be trained to classify or extract relevant data.

But how easy is to get started with textual analysis?

As with most things related to artificial intelligence (AI), automated text analysis is perceived as a complex tool, only accessible to those with programming skills. Fortunately, that’s no longer the case. AI platforms like MonkeyLearn are actually very simple to use and don’t require any previous machine learning expertise. First-time users can try different pre-trained text analysis models right away, and use them for specific purposes even if they don’t have coding skills or have never studied machine learning.

However, if you want to take full advantage of textual analysis and create your own customized models, you should understand how it works.

There are two steps you need to follow before running an automated analysis: data gathering and data preparation. Here, we’ll explain them more in detail:

Data gathering : when we think of a topic we want to analyze, we should first make sure that we can obtain the data we need. Let’s say you want to analyze all the customer support tickets your company has received over a designated period of time. You should be able to export that information from your software and create a CSV or an Excel file. The data can be either internal (that is, data that’s only available to your business, like emails, support tickets, chats, spreadsheets, surveys, databases, etc) or external (like review sites, social media, news outlets or other websites).

Data preparation : before performing automated text analysis it’s necessary to prepare the data that you are going to use. This is done by applying a series of Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques. Tokenization , parsing , lemmatization , stemming and stopword removal are just a few of them.

Once these steps are complete, you will be all set up for the data analysis itself. In this section, we’ll refer to how the most common textual analysis methods work: text classification and text extraction.

Text classification is the process of assigning tags to a collection of data based on its content.

When done manually, text categorization is a time-consuming task that often leads to mistakes and inaccuracies. By doing this automatically, it is possible to obtain very good results while spending less time and resources. Automatic text classification consists of three main approaches: rule-based, machine learning and hybrid.

Rule-based systems

Rule-based systems follow an ‘if-then’ (condition-action) structure based on linguistic rules. Basically, rules are human-made associations between a linguistic pattern on a text and a predefined tag. These linguistic patterns often refer to morphological, syntactic, lexical, semantic, or phonological aspects.

For instance, this could be a rule to classify a series of laptop descriptions:

( Lenovo | Sony | Hewlett Packard | Apple ) → Brand

In this case, when the text classification model detects any of those words within a text (the ‘if’ portion), it will assign the predefined tag ‘brand’ to them (the ‘then’ portion).

One of the main advantages of rule-based systems is that they are easy to understand by humans. On the downside, creating complex systems is quite tricky, because you need to have good knowledge of linguistics and of the topics present in the text that you want to analyze. Besides, adding new rules can be tough as it requires several tests, making rule-based systems hard to scale.

Machine learning-based systems

Machine learning-based systems are trained to make predictions based on examples. This means that a person needs to provide representative and consistent samples and assign the expected tags manually so that the system learns to make its own predictions from those past observations. The collection of manually tagged data is called training data .

But how does machine learning actually work?

Suppose you are training a machine learning-based classifier. The system needs to transform the training data into something it can understand: in this case, vectors (an array of numbers with encoded data). Vectors contain a set of relevant features from the given text, and use them to learn and make predictions on future data.

One of the most common methods for text vectorization is called bag of words and consists of counting how many times a particular word (from a predetermined list of words) appears in the text you want to analyze.

So, the text is transformed into vectors and fed into a machine learning algorithm along with its expected tags, creating a text classification model:

After being trained, the model can make predictions over unseen data:

Machine learning algorithms

The most common algorithms used in text classification are Naive Bayes family of algorithms (NB), Support Vector Machines (SVM), and deep learning algorithms .

Naive Bayes family of algorithms (NB) is a probabilistic algorithm that uses Bayes’ theorem to calculate the probability of each tag for a given text. It then provides the tag with the highest likelihood of occurrence. This algorithm provides good results as long as the training data is scarce.

Support Vector Machines (SVM) is a machine learning algorithm that divides vectors into two different groups within a three-dimensional space. In one group, you have vectors that belong to a given tag, and in the other group vectors that don’t belong to that tag. Using this algorithm requires more coding skills, but the results are better than the ones with Naive Bayes.

Deep learning algorithms try to emulate the way the human brain thinks. They use millions of training examples and generate very rich representations of texts, leading to much more accurate predictions than other machine learning algorithms. The downside is that they need vast amounts of training data to provide accurate results and require intensive coding.

Hybrid systems

These systems combine rule-based systems and machine learning-based systems to obtain more accurate predictions.

There are different parameters to evaluate the performance of a text classifier: accuracy , precision , recall , and F1 score .

You can measure how your text classifier works by comparing it to a fixed testing set (that is, a group of data that already includes its expected tags) or by using cross-validation, a process that divides your training data into two groups – one used to train the model, and the other used to test the results.

Let’s go into more detail about each of these parameters:

Accuracy : this is the number of correct predictions that the text classifier makes divided by the total number of predictions. However, accuracy alone is not the best parameter to analyze the performance of a text classifier. When the number of examples is imbalanced (for example, a lot of the data belongs to one of the categories) you may experience an accuracy paradox , that is, a model with high accuracy, but one that’s not necessarily able to make accurate predictions for all tags. In this case, it’s better to look at precision and recall, and F1 score.

Precision : this metric indicates the number of correct predictions for a given tag, divided by the total number of correct and incorrect predictions for that tag. In this case, a high precision level indicates there were less false positives. For some tasks ― like sending automated email responses ― you will need text classification models with a high level of precision, that will only deliver an answer when it’s highly likely that the recipient belongs to a given tag.

Recall : it shows the number of correct predictions for a given tag, over the number of predictions that should have been predicted as belonging to that tag. High recall metrics indicate there were less false negatives and, if routing support tickets for example, it means that tickets will be sent to the right teams.

F1 score : this metric considers both precision and recall results, and provides an idea of how well your text classifier is working. It allows you to see how accurate is your model for all the tags you’re using.

Cross-validation

Cross-validation is a method used to measure the accuracy of a text classifier model. It consists of splitting the training dataset into a number of equal-length subsets, in a random way. For instance, let’s imagine you have four subsets and each of them contains 25% of your training data.

All of those subsets except one are used to train the text classifier. Then, the classifier is used to make predictions over the remaining subset. After this, you need to compile all the metrics we mentioned before (accuracy, precision, recall, and F1 score), and start the process all over again, until all the subsets have been used for testing. Finally, all the results are compiled to obtain the average performance of each metric.

Text extraction is the process of identifying specific pieces of text from unstructured data. This is very useful for a variety of purposes, from extracting company names from a Linkedin dataset to pulling out prices on product descriptions.

Text extraction allows to automatically visualize where the relevant terms or expressions are, without needing to read or scan all the text by yourself. And that is particularly relevant when you have massive databases, which would otherwise take ages to analyze manually.

There are different approaches to text extraction. Here, we’ll refer to the most commonly used and reliable:

Regular expressions

Regular expressions are similar to rules for text classification models. They can be defined as a series of characters that define a pattern.

Every time the text extractor detects a coincidence with a pattern, it assigns the corresponding tag.

This approach allows you to create text extractors quickly and with good results, as long as you find the right patterns for the data you want to analyze. However, as it gets more complex, it can be hard to manage and scale.

Conditional Random Fields

Conditional Random Fields (CRF) is a statistical approach used for text extraction with machine learning. It identifies different patterns by assigning a weight to each of the word sequences within a text. CRF’s also allow you to create additional parameters related to the patterns, based on syntactic or semantic information.

This approach creates more complex and richer patterns than regular expressions and can encode a large volume of information. However, if you want to train the text extractor properly, you will need to have in-depth NLP and computing knowledge.

You can use the same performance metrics that we mentioned for text classification (accuracy, precision, recall, and F1 score), although these metrics only consider exact matches as positive results, leaving partial matches aside.

If you want partial matches to be included in the results, you should use a performance metric called ROUGE (Recall-Oriented Understudy for Gisting Evaluation). This group of metrics measures lengths and numbers of sequences to make a match between the source text and the extraction performed by the model.

The parameters used to compare these two texts need to be defined manually. You may define ROUGE-n metrics (n is the length of the units you want to measure) or ROUGE-L metrics (to compare the longest common sentence).

Use Cases and Applications

Automated textual analysis is the process of obtaining meaningful information out of raw data. Considering unstructured data is getting closer to 80% of the existing information in the digital world , it’s easy to understand why this brings outstanding opportunities for businesses, organizations, and academic researchers.

For companies, it is now possible to obtain real-time insights on how their users feel about their products and make better business decisions based on data. Shifting to a data-driven approach is one of the main challenges of businesses today.

Textual analysis has many exciting applications across different areas of a company, like customer service, marketing, product, or sales. By allowing the automation of specific tasks that used to be manual, textual analysis is helping teams become more productive and efficient, and allowing them to focus on areas where they can add real value.

In the academic research field, computer-assisted textual analysis (and mainly, machine learning-based models) are expanding the horizons of investigation, by providing new ways of processing, classifying, and obtaining relevant data.

In this section, we’ll describe the most significant applications related to customer service, customer feedback, and academic research.

Customer Service

It’s not all about having an amazing product or investing a lot of money on advertising. What really tips the balance when it comes to business success is to provide high-quality customer service. Stats claim that 70% of the customer journey is defined by how people feel they are being treated .

So, how can textual analysis help companies deliver a better customer service experience?

Automatically tag support tickets

Every time a customer sends a request, comment, or complain, there’s a new support ticket to be processed. Customer support teams need to categorize every incoming message based on its content, a routine task that can be boring, time-consuming, and inconsistent if done manually.

Textual analysis with machine learning allows you automatically identify the topic of each support ticket and tag it accordingly. How does it work?

• First, a person defines a set of categories and trains a classifier model by applying the appropriate tags to a number of representative samples.
• The model analyzes the words and expressions used in each ticket. For example: ‘I’m having problems when paying with my credit card’ , and it compares it with previous examples.
• Finally, it automatically tags the ticket according to its content. In this case, the ticket would be tagged as Payment Issues .

Automatically route and triage support tickets

Once support tickets are tagged, they need to be routed to the appropriate team in charge to deal with that issue. Machine learning enables teams to send a ticket to the right person in real-time , based on the ticket’s topic, language or complexity. For example, a ticket previously tagged as Payment Issues will be automatically routed to the Billing Area .

Detect the urgency of a ticket

A simple task, like being able to prioritize tickets based on their urgency, can have a substantial positive impact on your customer service. By analyzing the content of each ticket, a textual analysis model can let you assess which of them are more critical and prioritize accordingly . For instance, a ticket containing the words or expressions ‘as soon as possible’ or ‘immediately’ would be automatically classified as Urgent .

Get insights from ticket analytics

The performance of customer service teams is usually measured by KPI’s, like first response time, the average time of resolution, and customer satisfaction (CSAT).

Textual analysis algorithms can be used to analyze the different interactions between customers and the customer service area, like chats, support tickets, emails, and customer satisfaction surveys.

You can use aspect-based sentiment analysis to understand the main topics discussed by your customers and how they are feeling about those topics. For example, you may have a lot of mentions referring to the topic ‘UI/UX’ . But, are all those customers’ opinions positive, negative, or neutral? This type of analysis can provide a more accurate perspective of what they think about your product and get a deeper understanding the overall customer satisfaction.

Customer Feedback

Listening to the Voice of Customer (VoC) is critical to understand the customers’ expectations, experience and opinion about your brand. Two of the most common tools to monitor and examine customer feedback are customer surveys and product reviews.

By analyzing customer feedback data, companies can detect topics for improvement, spot product flaws, get a better understanding of your customer’s needs and measure their level of satisfaction, among many other things.

But how do you process and analyze tons of reviews or thousands of customer surveys? Here are some ideas of how you can use textual analysis algorithms to analyze different kinds of customer feedback:

Analyze NPS Responses

Net Promoter Score (NPS) is the most popular tool to measure customer satisfaction. The first part of the survey involves giving the brand a score from 0 to 10 based on the question: 'How likely is it that you would recommend [brand] to a friend or colleague?' . The results allow you to classify your customers as promoters , passives , and detractors .

Then, there’s a follow-up question, inquiring about the reasons for your previous score. These open-ended responses often provide the most insightful information about your company. At the same time, it’s the most complex data to process. Yes, you could read and tag each of the responses manually, but what if there are thousands of them?

Textual analysis with machine learning enables you to detect the main topics that your customers are referring to, and even extract the most relevant keywords related to those topics . To make the most of your data, you could also perform sentiment analysis and find out if your customers are talking about a given topic positively or negatively.

Analyze Customer Surveys

Besides NPS, textual analysis algorithms can help you analyze all sorts of customer surveys. Using a text classification model to tag your responses can make you save a lot of valuable time and resources while allowing you to obtain consistent results.

Analyze Product Reviews

Product reviews are a significant factor when buying a product. Prospective buyers read at least 10 reviews before feeling they can trust a local business and that’s just one of the (many) reasons why you should keep a close eye on what people are saying about your brand online.

Analyzing product reviews can give you an idea of what people love and hate the most about your product and service. It can provide useful insights and opportunities for improvement. And it can show you what to do to get one step ahead of your competition.

The truth is that going through pages and pages of product reviews is not a very exciting task. Categorizing all those opinions can take teams hours and in the end, it becomes an expensive and unproductive process. That’s why automated textual analysis is a game-changer.

Imagine you want to analyze a set of product reviews from your SaaS company in G2 Crowd. A textual analysis model will allow you to tag g each review based on topic, like Ease of Use , Price , UI/UX , Integrations . You could also run a sentiment analysis to discover how your customers feel about those topics: do they think the price is suitable or too expensive? Do they find it too complex or easy to use?

Thanks to textual analysis algorithms, you can get powerful information to help you make data-driven decisions, and empower your teams to be more productive by reducing manual tasks to a minimum.

Academic Research

What if you were able to sift through tons of papers and journals, and discover data that is relevant to your research in just seconds? Just imagine if you could easily classify years of news articles and extract meaningful keywords from them, or analyze thousands of tweets after a significant political change .

Even though machine learning applications in business and science seem to be more frequent, social science research is also benefiting from ML to perform tasks related to the academic world.

Social science researchers need to deal with vast volumes of unstructured data. Therefore, one of the major opportunities provided by computer-assisted textual analysis is being able to classify data, extract relevant information, or identify different groups in extensive collections of data.

Another application of textual analysis with machine learning is supporting the coding process . Coding is one of the early steps of any qualitative textual analysis. It involves a detailed examination of what you want to analyze to become familiar with the data. When done manually, this task can be very time consuming and often inaccurate or inconsistent. Fortunately, machine learning algorithms (like text classifier models) can help you do this in very little time and allow you to scale up the coding process easily.

Finally, using machine learning algorithms to scan large amounts of papers, databases, and journal articles can lead to new investigation hypotheses .

Final Words

In a world overloaded with data, textual analysis with machine learning is a powerful tool that enables you to make sense of unstructured information and find what’s relevant in just seconds.

With promising use cases across many fields from marketing to social science research, machine learning algorithms are far from being a niche technology only available for a few. Moreover, they are turning into user-friendly applications that are dominated by workers with little or no coding skills.

Thanks to text analysis models, teams are becoming more productive by being released from manual and routine tasks that used to take valuable time from them. At the same time, companies can make better decisions based on valuable, real-time insights obtained from data.

By now, you probably have an idea of what textual analysis is with machine learning and how you can use it to make your everyday tasks more efficient and straightforward. Ready to get started? MonkeyLearn makes it very simple to take your first steps. Just contact us and get a personalized demo from one of our experts!

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The Power of Analysis: Tips and Tricks for Writing Analysis Essays: Home

Crystal sosa.

Helpful Links

• Super Search Webpage Where to start your research.
• Scribbr Textual analysis guide.
• Analyzing Texts Prezi Presentation A prezi presentation on analyzing texts.
• Writing Essays Guide A guide to writing essays/
• Why is it important?
• Explanation & Example
• Different Types of Analysis Essays

Text analysis and writing analysis texts are important skills to develop as they allow individuals to critically engage with written material, understand underlying themes and arguments, and communicate their own ideas in a clear and effective manner. These skills are essential in academic and professional settings, as well as in everyday life, as they enable individuals to evaluate information and make informed decisions.

What is Text Analysis?

Text analysis is the process of examining and interpreting a written or spoken text to understand its meaning, structure, and context. It involves breaking down the text into its constituent parts, such as words, phrases, and sentences, and analyzing how they work together to convey a particular message or idea.

Text analysis can be used to explore a wide range of textual material, including literature, poetry, speeches, and news articles, and it is often employed in academic research, literary criticism, and media analysis. By analyzing texts, we can gain deeper insights into their meanings, uncover hidden messages and themes, and better understand the social and cultural contexts in which they were produced.

What is an Analysis Essay?

An analysis essay is a type of essay that requires the writer to analyze and interpret a particular text or topic. The goal of an analysis essay is to break down the text or topic into smaller parts and examine each part carefully. This allows the writer to make connections between different parts of the text or topic and develop a more comprehensive understanding of it.

In “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Charlotte Perkins Gilman uses the first-person point of view and vivid descriptions of the protagonist’s surroundings to convey the protagonist’s psychological deterioration. By limiting the reader’s understanding of the story’s events to the protagonist’s perspective, Gilman creates a sense of claustrophobia and paranoia, mirroring the protagonist’s own feelings. Additionally, the use of sensory language, such as the “smooch of rain,” and descriptions of the “yellow wallpaper” and its “sprawling flamboyant patterns,” further emphasize the protagonist’s sensory and emotional experience. Through these techniques, Gilman effectively communicates the protagonist’s descent into madness and the effects of societal oppression on women’s mental health.

There are several different types of analysis essays, including:

Literary Analysis Essays: These essays examine a work of literature and analyze various literary devices such as character development, plot, theme, and symbolism.

Rhetorical Analysis Essays: These essays examine how authors use language and rhetoric to persuade their audience, focusing on the author's tone, word choice, and use of rhetorical devices.

Film Analysis Essays: These essays analyze a film's themes, characters, and visual elements, such as cinematography and sound.

Visual Analysis Essays: These essays analyze visual art, such as paintings or sculptures, and explore how the artwork's elements work together to create meaning.

Historical Analysis Essays: These essays analyze historical events or documents and examine their causes, effects, and implications.

Comparative Analysis Essays: These essays compare and contrast two or more works, focusing on similarities and differences between them.

Process Analysis Essays: These essays explain how to do something or how something works, providing a step-by-step analysis of a process.

Analyzing Texts

• General Tips
• How to Analyze
• What to Analyze

When writing an essay, it's essential to analyze your topic thoroughly. Here are some suggestions for analyzing your topic:

Read carefully: Start by reading your text or prompt carefully. Make sure you understand the key points and what the text or prompt is asking you to do.

Analyze the text or topic thoroughly: Analyze the text or topic thoroughly by breaking it down into smaller parts and examining each part carefully. This will help you make connections between different parts of the text or topic and develop a more comprehensive understanding of it.

Identify key concepts: Identify the key concepts, themes, and ideas in the text or prompt. This will help you focus your analysis.

Take notes: Take notes on important details and concepts as you read. This will help you remember what you've read and organize your thoughts.

Consider different perspectives: Consider different perspectives and interpretations of the text or prompt. This can help you create a more well-rounded analysis.

Use evidence: Use evidence from the text or outside sources to support your analysis. This can help you make your argument stronger and more convincing.

Formulate your thesis statement: Based on your analysis of the essay, formulate your thesis statement. This should be a clear and concise statement that summarizes your main argument.

Use clear and concise language: Use clear and concise language to communicate your ideas effectively. Avoid using overly complicated language that may confuse your reader.

Revise and edit: Revise and edit your essay carefully to ensure that it is clear, concise, and free of errors.

• Understanding the assignment: Make sure you fully understand the assignment and the purpose of the analysis. This will help you focus your analysis and ensure that you are meeting the requirements of the assignment.

Read the essay multiple times: Reading the essay multiple times will help you to identify the author's main argument, key points, and supporting evidence.

Take notes: As you read the essay, take notes on key points, quotes, and examples. This will help you to organize your thoughts and identify patterns in the author's argument.

Take breaks: It's important to take breaks while reading academic essays to avoid burnout. Take a break every 20-30 minutes and do something completely different, like going for a walk or listening to music. This can help you to stay refreshed and engaged.

Highlight or underline key points: As you read, highlight or underline key points, arguments, and evidence that stand out to you. This will help you to remember and analyze important information later.

Ask questions: Ask yourself questions as you read to help you engage critically with the text. What is the author's argument? What evidence do they use to support their claims? What are the strengths and weaknesses of their argument?

Engage in active reading: Instead of passively reading, engage in active reading by asking questions, making connections to other readings or personal experiences, and reflecting on what you've read.

Find a discussion partner: Find someone to discuss the essay with, whether it's a classmate, a friend, or a teacher. Discussing the essay can help you to process and analyze the information more deeply, and can also help you to stay engaged.

• Identify the author's purpose and audience: Consider why the author wrote the essay and who their intended audience is. This will help you to better understand the author's perspective and the purpose of their argument.

Analyze the structure of the essay: Consider how the essay is structured and how this supports the author's argument. Look for patterns in the organization of ideas and the use of transitions.

Evaluate the author's use of evidence: Evaluate the author's use of evidence and how it supports their argument. Consider whether the evidence is credible, relevant, and sufficient to support the author's claims.

Consider the author's tone and style: Consider the author's tone and style and how it contributes to their argument. Look for patterns in the use of language, imagery, and rhetorical devices.

Consider the context : Consider the context in which the essay was written, such as the author's background, the time period, and any societal or cultural factors that may have influenced their perspective.

Evaluate the evidence: Evaluate the evidence presented in the essay and consider whether it is sufficient to support the author's argument. Look for any biases or assumptions that may be present in the evidence.

Consider alternative viewpoints: Consider alternative viewpoints and arguments that may challenge the author's perspective. This can help you to engage critically with the text and develop a more well-rounded understanding of the topic.

• Last Updated: Jun 21, 2023 1:01 PM
• URL: https://odessa.libguides.com/analysis

16.3 Glance at Genre: Print or Textual Analysis

Learning outcomes.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Define key terms and organizational patterns of textual analysis.
• Explain how genre conventions are shaped by purpose, culture, and expectation.

As a genre —or literary category in which works feature similar forms, styles, or subject matter—textual analysis is less of a genre in itself and more of an exploration and interpretation of other genres. That is, textual analysis is explanatory and interpretive. When you receive an assignment to analyze a text, you focus on the elements that give it meaning. Usually your instructor will assign a specific writing task: to analyze and explain certain aspects of a text, to compare or contrast certain elements within a single text or in two or more texts, or to relate certain text elements to historical context or current events (as student writer Gwyn Garrison has done in the Annotated Student Sample ). These writing tasks thus explore genre characteristics of fiction, drama, poetry, literary nonfiction, film, and other forms of literary language.

When you write a textual analysis, ask yourself questions such as these:

• In what ways can this text be read?
• What are some different ways of reading it?
• Which reading makes the most sense to me?
• Which passages in the text support this reading?
• Whom does my analysis need to convince? (Who is my audience?)

Textual Analysis and Interpretive Communities

How you read and analyze a text depends on who you are. Who you are depends on the influences that have shaped you, or the communities to which you belong. Everyone belongs to various communities: families, social and economic groups (e.g., students or teachers, middle or working class), organizations (e.g., Democratic or Republican Party, Masons, Habitat for Humanity), geographic locales (e.g., rural or urban, north or south), and institutions (e.g., school, church, fraternity). Your membership in one or more communities may determine how you view and respond to the world. The communities that influence you most are called interpretive communities ; they influence the meaning you make of the world. People who belong to the same community may well have similar assumptions and therefore are likely to analyze texts in similar ways.

Before writing an interpretive or textual analysis essay, it is helpful to ask, Who am I when writing this piece? Be aware of your age, gender, race, ethnic identity, economic class, geographic location, educational level, or political or religious persuasion. Ask to what extent and for what purpose any of these identities emerges in your writing. Readers will examine the biases you may bring to your work, understanding that everyone views the world—and, consequently, texts—from their own vantage point.

College is, of course, a large interpretive community. The various smaller communities that exist within it are called disciplines: English, history, biology, business, art, and so on. Established ways of interpreting texts exist within disciplines. Often when you write a textual analysis, you will do so from the perspective of a traditional academic interpretive community or from the perspective of one who challenges that community.

Whether you deliberately identify yourself and any biases you might bring with you in your essay depends on the assignment you are given. Some assignments ask you to remove your personal perspective as much as possible from your writing, others ask that you acknowledge and explain it, and others fall somewhere in between.

Conventions of Textual Analysis

When asked to analyze or interpret a literary work, whether fiction or nonfiction, you will likely focus on some of these literary elements to explain how an author uses them to make meaning.

• Alliteration: literary device consisting of repetition of initial consonant sounds. (“Away from the steamy sidewalk, the children sat in a circle.”)
• Analysis: close examination and explanation of a text, supported by reasoning and evidence.
• Antagonist: character or force opposing the main character (protagonist) in a story.
• Climax: moment of emotional or intellectual intensity or a point in the plot when one opposing force overcomes another and the conflict is resolved.
• Epiphany: flash of intuitive understanding by the narrator or a character in a story.
• Figurative language: language that suggests special meanings or effects. Similes and metaphors are examples of figurative, rather than literal, language. (“She stands like a tree, solid and rooted.”)
• Imagery: language that appeals to one (or more) of the five senses. (“The cicadas hummed nonstop all day, but never loud enough to dull the roar of the leaf blowers.)
• Metaphor: direct comparison between two unlike things. (“She is a sly fox in her undercover work for the government.”)
• Narrator: someone who tells a story. A character narrator is a part of the story, whereas an omniscient narrator tells a story about others.
• Persona: mask to disguise or cover the author’s real self when presenting a story or other literary work.
• Plot: sequence of events in a story or play.
• Point of view: vantage point from which a story or event is perceived and told. The most frequently used points of view are first person and third person. In first person, the narrator is a character or observer in the story (fiction) or the author of it (nonfiction). In third person, the narrator has no part in the story other than telling it.
• Protagonist: main character or hero in a story.
• Rhyme: repetition of sounds, usually at the ends of lines in poems, but also occurring at other intervals in a line.
• Rhythm: rise and fall of stressed sounds within sentences, paragraphs, and stanzas.
• Simile: indirect comparison of unlike things using the word as or like . (“When he does undercover work, he is as sly as a fox.”)
• Symbol: object that represents itself and something else at the same time. A red rose is both a rose of a certain color and the suggestion of something romantic.
• Theme: meaning or thesis of a literary text.

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Sat / act prep online guides and tips, 5 steps to write a great analytical essay.

General Education

Do you need to write an analytical essay for school? What sets this kind of essay apart from other types, and what must you include when you write your own analytical essay? In this guide, we break down the process of writing an analytical essay by explaining the key factors your essay needs to have, providing you with an outline to help you structure your essay, and analyzing a complete analytical essay example so you can see what a finished essay looks like.

What Is an Analytical Essay?

Before you begin writing an analytical essay, you must know what this type of essay is and what it includes. Analytical essays analyze something, often (but not always) a piece of writing or a film.

An analytical essay is more than just a synopsis of the issue though; in this type of essay you need to go beyond surface-level analysis and look at what the key arguments/points of this issue are and why. If you’re writing an analytical essay about a piece of writing, you’ll look into how the text was written and why the author chose to write it that way. Instead of summarizing, an analytical essay typically takes a narrower focus and looks at areas such as major themes in the work, how the author constructed and supported their argument, how the essay used literary devices to enhance its messages, etc.

While you certainly want people to agree with what you’ve written, unlike with persuasive and argumentative essays, your main purpose when writing an analytical essay isn’t to try to convert readers to your side of the issue. Therefore, you won’t be using strong persuasive language like you would in those essay types. Rather, your goal is to have enough analysis and examples that the strength of your argument is clear to readers.

Besides typical essay components like an introduction and conclusion, a good analytical essay will include:

• A thesis that states your main argument
• Analysis that relates back to your thesis and supports it
• Examples to support your analysis and allow a more in-depth look at the issue

In the rest of this article, we’ll explain how to include each of these in your analytical essay.

How to Structure Your Analytical Essay

Analytical essays are structured similarly to many other essays you’ve written, with an introduction (including a thesis), several body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Below is an outline you can follow when structuring your essay, and in the next section we go into more detail on how to write an analytical essay.

Introduction

Your introduction will begin with some sort of attention-grabbing sentence to get your audience interested, then you’ll give a few sentences setting up the topic so that readers have some context, and you’ll end with your thesis statement. Your introduction will include:

• Brief background information explaining the issue/text
• Your thesis

Body Paragraphs

Your analytical essay will typically have three or four body paragraphs, each covering a different point of analysis. Begin each body paragraph with a sentence that sets up the main point you’ll be discussing. Then you’ll give some analysis on that point, backing it up with evidence to support your claim. Continue analyzing and giving evidence for your analysis until you’re out of strong points for the topic. At the end of each body paragraph, you may choose to have a transition sentence that sets up what the next paragraph will be about, but this isn’t required. Body paragraphs will include:

• Introductory sentence explaining what you’ll cover in the paragraph (sort of like a mini-thesis)
• Analysis point
• Evidence (either passages from the text or data/facts) that supports the analysis
• (Repeat analysis and evidence until you run out of examples)

You won’t be making any new points in your conclusion; at this point you’re just reiterating key points you’ve already made and wrapping things up. Begin by rephrasing your thesis and summarizing the main points you made in the essay. Someone who reads just your conclusion should be able to come away with a basic idea of what your essay was about and how it was structured. After this, you may choose to make some final concluding thoughts, potentially by connecting your essay topic to larger issues to show why it’s important. A conclusion will include:

• Paraphrase of thesis
• Summary of key points of analysis
• Final concluding thought(s)

5 Steps for Writing an Analytical Essay

Follow these five tips to break down writing an analytical essay into manageable steps. By the end, you’ll have a fully-crafted analytical essay with both in-depth analysis and enough evidence to support your argument. All of these steps use the completed analytical essay in the next section as an example.

#1: Pick a Topic

You may have already had a topic assigned to you, and if that’s the case, you can skip this step. However, if you haven’t, or if the topic you’ve been assigned is broad enough that you still need to narrow it down, then you’ll need to decide on a topic for yourself. Choosing the right topic can mean the difference between an analytical essay that’s easy to research (and gets you a good grade) and one that takes hours just to find a few decent points to analyze

Before you decide on an analytical essay topic, do a bit of research to make sure you have enough examples to support your analysis. If you choose a topic that’s too narrow, you’ll struggle to find enough to write about.

For example, say your teacher assigns you to write an analytical essay about the theme in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath of exposing injustices against migrants. For it to be an analytical essay, you can’t just recount the injustices characters in the book faced; that’s only a summary and doesn’t include analysis. You need to choose a topic that allows you to analyze the theme. One of the best ways to explore a theme is to analyze how the author made his/her argument. One example here is that Steinbeck used literary devices in the intercalary chapters (short chapters that didn’t relate to the plot or contain the main characters of the book) to show what life was like for migrants as a whole during the Dust Bowl.

You could write about how Steinbeck used literary devices throughout the whole book, but, in the essay below, I chose to just focus on the intercalary chapters since they gave me enough examples. Having a narrower focus will nearly always result in a tighter and more convincing essay (and can make compiling examples less overwhelming).

#2: Write a Thesis Statement

Your thesis statement is the most important sentence of your essay; a reader should be able to read just your thesis and understand what the entire essay is about and what you’ll be analyzing. When you begin writing, remember that each sentence in your analytical essay should relate back to your thesis

In the analytical essay example below, the thesis is the final sentence of the first paragraph (the traditional spot for it). The thesis is: “In The Grapes of Wrath’s intercalary chapters, John Steinbeck employs a variety of literary devices and stylistic choices to better expose the injustices committed against migrants in the 1930s.” So what will this essay analyze? How Steinbeck used literary devices in the intercalary chapters to show how rough migrants could have it. Crystal clear.

#3: Do Research to Find Your Main Points

This is where you determine the bulk of your analysis--the information that makes your essay an analytical essay. My preferred method is to list every idea that I can think of, then research each of those and use the three or four strongest ones for your essay. Weaker points may be those that don’t relate back to the thesis, that you don’t have much analysis to discuss, or that you can’t find good examples for. A good rule of thumb is to have one body paragraph per main point

This essay has four main points, each of which analyzes a different literary device Steinbeck uses to better illustrate how difficult life was for migrants during the Dust Bowl. The four literary devices and their impact on the book are:

• Lack of individual names in intercalary chapters to illustrate the scope of the problem
• Parallels to the Bible to induce sympathy for the migrants
• Non-showy, often grammatically-incorrect language so the migrants are more realistic and relatable to readers
• Nature-related metaphors to affect the mood of the writing and reflect the plight of the migrants

#4: Find Excerpts or Evidence to Support Your Analysis

Now that you have your main points, you need to back them up. If you’re writing a paper about a text or film, use passages/clips from it as your main source of evidence. If you’re writing about something else, your evidence can come from a variety of sources, such as surveys, experiments, quotes from knowledgeable sources etc. Any evidence that would work for a regular research paper works here.

In this example, I quoted multiple passages from The Grapes of Wrath  in each paragraph to support my argument. You should be able to back up every claim you make with evidence in order to have a strong essay.

#5: Put It All Together

Now it's time to begin writing your essay, if you haven’t already. Create an introductory paragraph that ends with the thesis, make a body paragraph for each of your main points, including both analysis and evidence to back up your claims, and wrap it all up with a conclusion that recaps your thesis and main points and potentially explains the big picture importance of the topic.

Analytical Essay Example + Analysis

So that you can see for yourself what a completed analytical essay looks like, here’s an essay I wrote back in my high school days. It’s followed by analysis of how I structured my essay, what its strengths are, and how it could be improved.

One way Steinbeck illustrates the connections all migrant people possessed and the struggles they faced is by refraining from using specific titles and names in his intercalary chapters. While The Grapes of Wrath focuses on the Joad family, the intercalary chapters show that all migrants share the same struggles and triumphs as the Joads. No individual names are used in these chapters; instead the people are referred to as part of a group. Steinbeck writes, “Frantic men pounded on the doors of the doctors; and the doctors were busy.  And sad men left word at country stores for the coroner to send a car,” (555). By using generic terms, Steinbeck shows how the migrants are all linked because they have gone through the same experiences. The grievances committed against one family were committed against thousands of other families; the abuse extends far beyond what the Joads experienced. The Grapes of Wrath frequently refers to the importance of coming together; how, when people connect with others their power and influence multiplies immensely. Throughout the novel, the goal of the migrants, the key to their triumph, has been to unite. While their plans are repeatedly frustrated by the government and police, Steinbeck’s intercalary chapters provide a way for the migrants to relate to one another because they have encountered the same experiences. Hundreds of thousands of migrants fled to the promised land of California, but Steinbeck was aware that numbers alone were impersonal and lacked the passion he desired to spread. Steinbeck created the intercalary chapters to show the massive numbers of people suffering, and he created the Joad family to evoke compassion from readers.  Because readers come to sympathize with the Joads, they become more sensitive to the struggles of migrants in general. However, John Steinbeck frequently made clear that the Joads were not an isolated incident; they were not unique. Their struggles and triumphs were part of something greater. Refraining from specific names in his intercalary chapters allows Steinbeck to show the vastness of the atrocities committed against migrants.

Steinbeck also creates significant parallels to the Bible in his intercalary chapters in order to enhance his writing and characters. By using simple sentences and stylized writing, Steinbeck evokes Biblical passages. The migrants despair, “No work till spring. No work,” (556).  Short, direct sentences help to better convey the desperateness of the migrants’ situation. Throughout his novel, John Steinbeck makes connections to the Bible through his characters and storyline. Jim Casy’s allusions to Christ and the cycle of drought and flooding are clear biblical references.  By choosing to relate The Grapes of Wrath to the Bible, Steinbeck’s characters become greater than themselves. Starving migrants become more than destitute vagrants; they are now the chosen people escaping to the promised land. When a forgotten man dies alone and unnoticed, it becomes a tragedy. Steinbeck writes, “If [the migrants] were shot at, they did not run, but splashed sullenly away; and if they were hit, they sank tiredly in the mud,” (556). Injustices committed against the migrants become greater because they are seen as children of God through Steinbeck’s choice of language. Referencing the Bible strengthens Steinbeck’s novel and purpose: to create understanding for the dispossessed.  It is easy for people to feel disdain for shabby vagabonds, but connecting them to such a fundamental aspect of Christianity induces sympathy from readers who might have otherwise disregarded the migrants as so many other people did.

The simple, uneducated dialogue Steinbeck employs also helps to create a more honest and meaningful representation of the migrants, and it makes the migrants more relatable to readers. Steinbeck chooses to accurately represent the language of the migrants in order to more clearly illustrate their lives and make them seem more like real paper than just characters in a book. The migrants lament, “They ain’t gonna be no kinda work for three months,” (555). There are multiple grammatical errors in that single sentence, but it vividly conveys the despair the migrants felt better than a technically perfect sentence would. The Grapes of Wrath is intended to show the severe difficulties facing the migrants so Steinbeck employs a clear, pragmatic style of writing.  Steinbeck shows the harsh, truthful realities of the migrants’ lives and he would be hypocritical if he chose to give the migrants a more refined voice and not portray them with all their shortcomings. The depiction of the migrants as imperfect through their language also makes them easier to relate to. Steinbeck’s primary audience was the middle class, the less affluent of society. Repeatedly in The Grapes of Wrath , the wealthy make it obvious that they scorn the plight of the migrants. The wealthy, not bad luck or natural disasters, were the prominent cause of the suffering of migrant families such as the Joads. Thus, Steinbeck turns to the less prosperous for support in his novel. When referring to the superior living conditions barnyard animals have, the migrants remark, “Them’s horses-we’re men,” (556).  The perfect simplicity of this quote expresses the absurdness of the migrants’ situation better than any flowery expression could.

In The Grapes of Wrath , John Steinbeck uses metaphors, particularly about nature, in order to illustrate the mood and the overall plight of migrants. Throughout most of the book, the land is described as dusty, barren, and dead. Towards the end, however; floods come and the landscape begins to change. At the end of chapter twenty-nine, Steinbeck describes a hill after the floods saying, “Tiny points of grass came through the earth, and in a few days the hills were pale green with the beginning year,” (556). This description offers a stark contrast from the earlier passages which were filled with despair and destruction. Steinbeck’s tone from the beginning of the chapter changes drastically. Early in the chapter, Steinbeck had used heavy imagery in order to convey the destruction caused by the rain, “The streams and the little rivers edged up to the bank sides and worked at willows and tree roots, bent the willows deep in the current, cut out the roots of cottonwoods and brought down the trees,” (553). However, at the end of the chapter the rain has caused new life to grow in California. The new grass becomes a metaphor representing hope. When the migrants are at a loss over how they will survive the winter, the grass offers reassurance. The story of the migrants in the intercalary chapters parallels that of the Joads. At the end of the novel, the family is breaking apart and has been forced to flee their home. However, both the book and final intercalary chapter end on a hopeful note after so much suffering has occurred. The grass metaphor strengthens Steinbeck’s message because it offers a tangible example of hope. Through his language Steinbeck’s themes become apparent at the end of the novel. Steinbeck affirms that persistence, even when problems appear insurmountable, leads to success. These metaphors help to strengthen Steinbeck’s themes in The Grapes of Wrath because they provide a more memorable way to recall important messages.

John Steinbeck’s language choices help to intensify his writing in his intercalary chapters and allow him to more clearly show how difficult life for migrants could be. Refraining from using specific names and terms allows Steinbeck to show that many thousands of migrants suffered through the same wrongs. Imitating the style of the Bible strengthens Steinbeck’s characters and connects them to the Bible, perhaps the most famous book in history. When Steinbeck writes in the imperfect dialogue of the migrants, he creates a more accurate portrayal and makes the migrants easier to relate to for a less affluent audience. Metaphors, particularly relating to nature, strengthen the themes in The Grapes of Wrath by enhancing the mood Steinbeck wants readers to feel at different points in the book. Overall, the intercalary chapters that Steinbeck includes improve his novel by making it more memorable and reinforcing the themes Steinbeck embraces throughout the novel. Exemplary stylistic devices further persuade readers of John Steinbeck’s personal beliefs. Steinbeck wrote The Grapes of Wrath to bring to light cruelties against migrants, and by using literary devices effectively, he continuously reminds readers of his purpose. Steinbeck’s impressive language choices in his intercalary chapters advance the entire novel and help to create a classic work of literature that people still are able to relate to today. 

This essay sticks pretty closely to the standard analytical essay outline. It starts with an introduction, where I chose to use a quote to start off the essay. (This became my favorite way to start essays in high school because, if I wasn’t sure what to say, I could outsource the work and find a quote that related to what I’d be writing about.) The quote in this essay doesn’t relate to the themes I’m discussing quite as much as it could, but it’s still a slightly different way to start an essay and can intrigue readers. I then give a bit of background on The Grapes of Wrath and its themes before ending the intro paragraph with my thesis: that Steinbeck used literary devices in intercalary chapters to show how rough migrants had it.

Each of my four body paragraphs is formatted in roughly the same way: an intro sentence that explains what I’ll be discussing, analysis of that main point, and at least two quotes from the book as evidence.

My conclusion restates my thesis, summarizes each of four points I discussed in my body paragraphs, and ends the essay by briefly discussing how Steinbeck’s writing helped introduce a world of readers to the injustices migrants experienced during the dust bowl.

What does this analytical essay example do well? For starters, it contains everything that a strong analytical essay should, and it makes that easy to find. The thesis clearly lays out what the essay will be about, the first sentence of each of the body paragraph introduces the topic it’ll cover, and the conclusion neatly recaps all the main points. Within each of the body paragraphs, there’s analysis along with multiple excerpts from the book in order to add legitimacy to my points.

Additionally, the essay does a good job of taking an in-depth look at the issue introduced in the thesis. Four ways Steinbeck used literary devices are discussed, and for each of the examples are given and analysis is provided so readers can understand why Steinbeck included those devices and how they helped shaped how readers viewed migrants and their plight.

Where could this essay be improved? I believe the weakest body paragraph is the third one, the one that discusses how Steinbeck used plain, grammatically incorrect language to both accurately depict the migrants and make them more relatable to readers. The paragraph tries to touch on both of those reasons and ends up being somewhat unfocused as a result. It would have been better for it to focus on just one of those reasons (likely how it made the migrants more relatable) in order to be clearer and more effective. It’s a good example of how adding more ideas to an essay often doesn’t make it better if they don’t work with the rest of what you’re writing. This essay also could explain the excerpts that are included more and how they relate to the points being made. Sometimes they’re just dropped in the essay with the expectation that the readers will make the connection between the example and the analysis. This is perhaps especially true in the second body paragraph, the one that discusses similarities to Biblical passages. Additional analysis of the quotes would have strengthened it.

Summary: How to Write an Analytical Essay

What is an analytical essay? A critical analytical essay analyzes a topic, often a text or film. The analysis paper uses evidence to support the argument, such as excerpts from the piece of writing. All analytical papers include a thesis, analysis of the topic, and evidence to support that analysis.

When developing an analytical essay outline and writing your essay, follow these five steps:

Reading analytical essay examples can also give you a better sense of how to structure your essay and what to include in it.

What's Next?

Learning about different writing styles in school? There are four main writing styles, and it's important to understand each of them. Learn about them in our guide to writing styles , complete with examples.

Writing a research paper for school but not sure what to write about? Our guide to research paper topics has over 100 topics in ten categories so you can be sure to find the perfect topic for you.

Literary devices can both be used to enhance your writing and communication. Check out this list of 31 literary devices to learn more !

Christine graduated from Michigan State University with degrees in Environmental Biology and Geography and received her Master's from Duke University. In high school she scored in the 99th percentile on the SAT and was named a National Merit Finalist. She has taught English and biology in several countries.

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Textual Analysis: Definition, Approaches and Examples

Dive deep into Textual Analysis: use cases meaning and more

IN THIS ARTICLE

Introduction to textual analysis.

In the digital age where information is plentiful, Textual Analysis has emerged as a critical tool to decode the abundance of data surrounding us. It breaks down complexity and brings clarity to implicit meanings hidden within various forms of text, be it books, web articles, social media posts, client reviews, or script dialogues. The practice of Textual Analysis does more than just skim the surface; it dives deep into the content, dissects it, and uncovers valuable insights embedded within.

Textual Analysis encompasses not only the understanding of what is explicitly stated in the text but also the implicit messages that remain unstated. It offers a systematic approach to interpreting how language is used to communicate and convey unique cultural contexts and meanings.

Definition of Textual Analysis

Textual Analysis is a research method that involves closely and critically examining written, spoken, or visual messages. It refers to the process of deconstructing text and its underlying themes, messages, and symbols - to understand the intentions, motivations, and perspectives of its creators.

The goal of Textual Analysis is to go beyond a mere descriptive stance and explore the hidden structures and intricate relations within a text. It encompasses a holistic comprehension of the content, wherein the text is read, understood, and interpreted in context to its larger sociocultural, historical, or political framework.

Importance of Textual Analysis in Different Fields

In today's interconnected and diverse world, Textual Analysis holds a significant position across several fields due to its ability to decode the complexities within a text.

In social sciences, scholars use Textual Analysis to understand human behavior, societal trends, and cultural narratives. It enables them to draw conclusions based on the textual evidence available for study.

In business and marketing, Textual Analysis has become an invaluable tool. Firms extensively utilize it to analyze consumer feedback, understand their audience's preferences, manage reputation, and make informed decisions. It can also help businesses comprehend market trends, understand competitor strategies, and shape their products or services accordingly.

Similarly, in media and communication studies, Textual Analysis is employed extensively to study media content, audience reception, and the socio-political aspects of media representation. Media critics and analysts often utilize this method to understand the subtext in advertising, news, TV shows, films, and digital media narratives.

In literature, textual analysis allows critics to delve deep into the text in search of hidden meanings, themes, or symbols. It enables them to interpret the author's perspectives, historical contexts, or implicit messages conveyed through the text.

The applications and the importance of Textual Analysis extend far beyond these examples, making it an integral part of the research toolkit in many fields. Its ability to help us decode and understand the complex world of text makes it an indispensable method in our ever-changing, increasingly text-saturated world.

Understanding the Concept of Textual Analysis

Textual analysis is a multidimensional research method that provides tools for researchers to gain deep insights into various types of texts. The core of textual analysis lies in the interpretation, comprehension, and contextual understanding of the text. It focuses on understanding the formation of the text, the language used the delivery of information, the audience's interpretation, and the overall impact created by the text.

Textual analysis is not limited to written texts. It embraces multiple forms of communication including spoken words, images, symbols, and multimedia content. This versatility makes textual analysis a preferred method for diverse fields, from literary studies to communication research, from cultural studies to marketing strategists.

Process Involved in Textual Analysis

The process of textual analysis can be divided into several stages.

• Descriptive Stage : This involves a thorough reading and summarization of the text. Understanding the broader context, author's perspective, and intended audience form an integral part of this stage.
• Analytical Stage : Drawing inferences and interpreting meanings comes under this stage. The occurrences of specific terms, recurrent themes, and patterns are analyzed here.
• Interpretive Stage : Unraveling underlying meanings and implicit messages that the text represents, and understanding symbolism, metaphorical representations, and other linguistic nuances fall under this stage.
• Evaluative Stage : The text is judged against certain pre-set standards or criteria. Questions like how engaging or persuasive the text is, how well the argument is built, or how impactful the delivery was can be answered here.

What does Textual Analysis entail?

Textual analysis entails looking beyond the surface level of the text and diving into its deeper levels. It seeks to understand the creator's intention, the message delivered, the language and style used, the audience response, and the cultural and socio-political context in which the text exists.

Textual analysis also entails understanding the power dynamics and ideologies prevalent in the text. For instance, gender roles, racial stereotypes, socio-political biases, or cultural norms can also be revealed through a careful analysis of the text.

From a business context, textual analysis also involves tracking customer reviews, social media comments, and customer queries to recognize brand perception, customer sentiment, trending topics, and areas for product improvement.

In a nutshell, textual analysis entails capturing the essence of the text, separating the explicit from the implicit, the said from the unsaid, and uncovering the hidden layers of context and meaning contained within the text.

Approaches to Textual Analysis

Textual analysis is an umbrella term that is composed of various methodologies, each affording a different perspective and understanding of the text. Mainly, these approaches can be categorized into qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods.

The Qualitative Textual Analysis

Qualitative textual analysis, as the name suggests, focuses on the quality rather than the quantity of the information present in the text. This approach is more interpretative and subjective in nature. It attempts to explore the text’s meanings, themes, motifs, or symbols in depth.

The importance of qualitative textual analysis lies in its ability to capture the complexities and nuances of the text. It provides the researcher with in-depth knowledge and understanding of the content, its socio-cultural construction, its ideological nuances, and the impact it could have on the readers.

An example of qualitative textual analysis could be studying the speeches of a political leader. The analysis would decipher the use of language, rhetoric, recurrent themes, values promoted, ideological stances, and the potential influence on the target audience.

The Quantitative Textual Analysis

Quantitative textual analysis deals with the quantifiable elements of the text such as word frequency, length of sentences, repetition of certain phrases etc. This method employs statistical or computational tools to interpret large volumes of text and identify patterns, trends or associations.

The significance of quantitative textual analysis lies in its ability to manage huge sets of textual data and give empirical evidence to the findings. It offers a more objective and generalized understanding of the text.

An example of quantitative textual analysis could be a brand analyzing its customer reviews. The repetition of specific words or phrases, the mention of particular product features, positive or negative language patterns could be valuable for the brand to understand customer sentiment and improve their services.

The Mixed-Methods Approach in Textual Analysis

The mixed-methods approach is a combination of both qualitative and quantitative analyses. It aims to reconcile the depth of the qualitative analysis with the breadth of quantitative analysis.

This approach is critical as it provides a comprehensive understanding of the text by capturing both the explicit and implicit meanings, the countable and the abstract elements of the text.

For example, a mixed-methods approach in textual analysis might be applied in analyzing a novel. The quantitative analysis could explore the frequency of certain themes or symbols, while the qualitative analysis would delve into the interpretation and impact of these themes or symbols on the overall storyline, character development and reader's understanding.

Ultimately, the choice between qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods approaches in textual analysis depends on the research questions, the nature of the text, and the researcher’s personal epistemological and methodological standpoint.

Practical Examples of Textual Analysis in Different Sectors

Textual analysis in marketing.

In the marketing domain, textual analysis provides valuable insights into consumer feelings and sentiments about products, brands, and services. Marketers analyze text data from various sources including customer reviews, social media posts, surveys, and feedbacks. This analysis helps ascertain the marketing virtues of a product or a brand, uncover new market opportunities, detect problems early, and improve user experiences. Determining the frequency of certain phrases, for example, can help detect emerging market trends or changing consumer preferences.

Textual Analysis in Literary Criticism

Textual analysis forms the bedrock of literary criticism, enabling critics to probe deeper into the text and unearth implicit meanings, themes, and symbols. It gives an in-depth understanding of the characters, motives, conflicts, author's style, and perspective. Textual analysis in literature can also reveal the sociopolitical and historical contexts that influenced the text.

Textual Analysis in News Media

In news media, textual analysis is used to investigate the framing of events, portrayal of personalities, ideologies reflected in the news reports, and its impact on public opinion. By analyzing the media text, researchers can identify trends, biases, and preferences in news reporting.

Case Studies of Successful Application of Textual Analysis

The benefits of textual analysis can be illustrated through numerous case studies across fields. In the business sector, for instance, there have been cases where companies used textual analysis of social media conversations to inform product development. Similarly, in academia, researchers utilized textual analysis to explore the feminist themes in Alice Munro's writings, revealing subtleties that were missed in straightforward readings.

Common Challenges and Misconceptions in Textual Analysis

While textual analysis offers rich insights, it is not without its challenges and misconceptions. One common challenge involves the handling of large volumes of data in quantitative textual analysis, which necessitates sophisticated tools and expertise. A common misconception about textual analysis is that it is purely objective. In reality, researchers' backgrounds and perspectives can inevitably influence their interpretations of the text.

Conclusion: The Future of Textual Analysis

The importance and relevance of textual analysis are set to grow in the future with the explosion of textual data in the digital age. As businesses, researchers, and policymakers strive to navigate this vast textual landscape, the techniques of textual analysis will continue to evolve. Organizations, scholars, and developers who can leverage these strategies will gain a critical edge in understanding and interpreting the world of text around us.

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Retrieval Augmented Generation Tools: Pros and Cons Breakdown

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Textual Analysis Techniques: approaches to text analysis

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E238 Text Analysis Essay Example

Text Analysis Papers

For five of the six texts you read this semester, you will be expected to hand in a corresponding text analysis paper. A text analysis paper will focus upon an area of the work that you find interesting, significant, or feel merits discussion. A text analysis paper should be fairly formal, and should genuinely attempt to shed light on one or more aspects of the work. You may discuss the significance of character, plot, setting, symbol...whatever catches your fancy. Overall, I am looking for interesting and original insights concerning the reading assignment.

An ideal text analysis will be 2 pages in length, double-spaced, and typed. Your paper will explore a problem or point of interest created by a work of literature (this includes, but is not limited to, character motivation, thematic elements, contextual significance, culture, symbol, irony, etc.). Your ideas and insights will be based on information from the pages in the text we have read so far (outside research is encouraged, but not at all necessary), calling upon specific examples to illustrate the idea or issue you are exploring. Your grade will be based on the quality and depth of your insights, and on the use of specific textual evidence as support. Avoid the obvious. Take risks--Make it interesting! This is an issue that the class may be asked to discuss at a later date.

Possible starting places for your text analysis include an author's life, politics, the social context of the work, philosophical musings, how and why the work evokes a particular feeling in you, cultural relevance, or the components of the text such as the significance of setting, narrative voice, imagery, or symbolism. Or, perhaps you will read a critical approach to the text and use it as a springboard for your own ideas (the library database Contemporary Literary Criticism Select is often a nice starting place). Or, you may wish to explore the relationship between various elements of the text (How does setting influence character?). Or, perhaps you would like to build on an idea touched on in class discussion. As we move on into the later weeks of the course, you may even wish to direct your questions toward identifying patterns between texts, and asking what the significance of these patterns might be.

The Dos and Don'ts of Text Analysis Papers:

**Remember: Text analysis papers must be typed and submitted on time. They will be evaluated on the basis of focus, development, use of evidence, creativity, and level of insight. They will count as 30% of your final grade.

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Textual Analysis – Definition, Approaches & Fields

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Textual communication surrounds a large part of the methodology used by researchers to analyze and interpret texts by studying their style, content, structure, purpose, and underlying meaning. Besides analyzing the text, textual analysis gives us a better and more detailed idea of how people communicate and represent their experiences and perspectives through writing. This article will outline the different approaches to textual analysis and in what fields of study it is commonly used.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

• 1 Textual Analysis – In a Nutshell
• 2 Definition: Textual analysis
• 3 What are the approaches to textual analysis?
• 4 Different fields of textual analysis

Textual Analysis – In a Nutshell

• Text can be defined simply as any instance of language in any medium that makes sense to someone who knows the language, e.g., newspaper articles and transcripts of spoken interviews and observations.
• The purpose of textual analysis is to describe the functions, content, and structure of messages contained in a text.
• This type of analysis is used in different fields, including literary studies (where it is most common), social sciences, and cultural and media studies.

Definition: Textual analysis

Textual analysis is a broad term that entails various research methods, which allow to analyze, describe, and interpret the characteristics of a recorded message. There are four main approaches typically used in academic writing. Nevertheless, textual analysis is also used in other fields, such as in cultural and media studies, social sciences, and literary studies.

An example of textual analysis is brand monitoring to determine social opinion on your brand in various contexts.

What are the approaches to textual analysis?

There are four main approaches to textual analysis, which are listed and discussed  below:

1. Rhetorical criticism

Rhetorical criticism is the systematic method of describing, analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating the persuasive force of messages within texts. At its core, rhetorical criticism is simply analyzing the use of rhetoric.

The process of rhetorical criticism has four steps :

• Select the text to study
• Choose the type of rhetorical criticism
• Analyze the chosen text using the chosen method
• Write a critical essay

The process of rhetorical criticism serves essential functions , including:

• Helping in understanding the historical, cultural, and social contexts
• Researchers can use it to evaluate society as a form of social criticism
• Helps illuminate the purpose of persuasive messages
• Teaching people what makes effective persuasion and how persuasion works

2. Content analysis

Content analysis is the analysis of specific message characteristics in a piece of text. It is usually considered unobtrusive since the analyzed texts already exist and are not being produced on request.

Content analysis can be both qualitative and quantitative, as described below:

• Quantitative – A systematic step-by-step procedure used to test hypotheses and answer research questions
• Qualitative – An approach that is more interested in the meanings of messages than the frequency of the occurrence of message variables.

The goals of content analysis include:

• Understanding the intentions of groups and individuals
• Identifying bias and propaganda
• Finding connections in how concepts are communicated
• Identifying communication differences in different contexts

3. Interaction analysis

Interaction analysis is the process of evaluating processes, determining the data requirements of each, and generating a matrix of what data is used by what process.

An interaction analysis involves two general tasks:

• Obtain a sample of interaction : When gathering a sample, the researchers’ choices affect the quality and type of data collected. Their choices determine if the interaction will be natural or structured, whether the location will be in a laboratory or another area, and the exact methods used to collect data.
• Analyzing the sample : Specific analysis of the collected samples will depend on the researchers’ goals and the form of the collected data.

4. Performance Studies

Performance studies is an approach that uses performance as the lens to study the world. There are six primary steps to undertaking a performance study:

Different fields of textual analysis

Textual analysis is a critical component of research in various fields of study, as discussed below.

Textual analysis in cultural and media studies

Researchers in cultural and media studies take media and cultural objects and treat them as texts to be analyzed.

• Media content
• Music videos
• Social media content.

Researchers in this field usually seek to connect contemporary culture and politics with text elements. In this context, the analysis is usually qualitative and creative. The different aspects of a text that a researcher may analyze include:

• The relationship with other relevant texts
• The design elements
• The word choice
• The location of the text
• The intended audience

Textual analysis in social sciences

Textual analysis in the social sciences is usually applied to texts like surveys, interview transcripts, and different media types to draw conclusions about social relations.

In this field, textual analysis usually takes a more quantitative approach, where certain text features’ frequency is measured numerically.

A researcher may investigate which words in a particular language are used most commonly, or which colors feature most in different advertisements aimed at different demographics.

Common methods of analyzing text in this field include discourse analysis, content analysis , and thematic analysis .

Textual analysis in literary studies

One of the most common uses of textual analysis is found in literary studies. Almost all works in this field – poems, plays, stories, novels – involve a comprehensive analysis. As this field deals with literary texts, a greater emphasis is usually placed on deliberately constructed elements such as the narrator’s voice and the rhyming scheme. In understanding these elements, the researcher lends more meaning to the text.

Textual analysis in this field also explores what the text reveals from the perspective through which the text was written, and finds new and unexpected ways to analyze classic pieces of text.

How do you write a textual analysis?

To write this analysis, the writer should analyze the structure, characters, setting, citations of a text, and central idea and themes. Consider the what, who, why, and where of the text you are analyzing.

What are the common approaches to textual analysis?

There are four primary textual analysis approaches:

• Rhetorical criticism
• Content analysis
• Interaction analysis
• Performance studies

What are the key features of textual analysis?

The key features of a textual analysis essay include:

• The summary and context of a text
• A statement of intent
• An explanation of the text’s continuing relevance

Why do we need to analyze texts?

The analysis helps extract a deeper meaning from a specific text and discover different perspectives in context.

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How To Write an Analytical Essay

If you enjoy exploring topics deeply and thinking creatively, analytical essays could be perfect for you. They involve thorough analysis and clever writing techniques to gain fresh perspectives and deepen your understanding of the subject. In this article, our expert research paper writer will explain what an analytical essay is, how to structure it effectively and provide practical examples. This guide covers all the essentials for your writing success!

What Is an Analytical Essay

An analytical essay involves analyzing something, such as a book, movie, or idea. It relies on evidence from the text to logically support arguments, avoiding emotional appeals or personal stories. Unlike persuasive essays, which argue for a specific viewpoint, a good analytical essay explores all aspects of the topic, considering different perspectives, dissecting arguments, and evaluating evidence carefully. Ultimately, you'll need to present your own stance based on your analysis, synthesize findings, and decide whether you agree with the conclusions or have your own interpretation.

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How to Structure an Analytical Essay

Crafting an excellent paper starts with clear organization and structuring of arguments. An analytical essay structure follows a simple outline: introduction, body, and conclusion.

Introduction: Begin by grabbing the reader's attention and stating the topic clearly. Provide background information, state the purpose of the paper, and hint at the arguments you'll make. The opening sentence should be engaging, such as a surprising fact or a thought-provoking question. Then, present your thesis, summarizing your stance in the essay.

Body Paragraphs: Each paragraph starts with a clear topic sentence guiding the reader and presents evidence supporting the thesis. Focus on one issue per paragraph and briefly restate the main point at the end to transition smoothly to the next one. This ensures clarity and coherence in your argument.

Conclusion: Restate the thesis, summarize key points from the body paragraphs, and offer insights on the significance of the analysis. Provide your thoughts on the topic's importance and how your analysis contributes to it, leaving a lasting impression on the reader.

Meanwhile, you might also be interested in how to write a reflection paper , so check out the article for more information!

How to Write an Analytical Essay in 6 Simple Steps

Once you've got a handle on the structure, you can make writing easier by following some steps. Preparing ahead of time can make the process smoother and improve your essay's flow. Here are some helpful tips from our experts. And if you need it, you can always request our experts to write my essay for me , and we'll handle it promptly.

Step 1: Decide on Your Stance

Before diving into writing, it's crucial to establish your stance on the topic. Let's say you're going to write an analytical essay example about the benefits and drawbacks of remote work. Before you start writing, you need to decide what your opinion or viewpoint is on this topic.

• Do you think remote work offers flexibility and improved work-life balance for employees?
• Or maybe you believe it can lead to feelings of isolation and decreased productivity?

Once you've determined your stance on remote work, it's essential to consider the evidence and arguments supporting your position. Are there statistics or studies that back up your viewpoint? For example, if you believe remote work improves productivity, you might cite research showing increased output among remote workers. On the other hand, if you think it leads to isolation, you could reference surveys or testimonials highlighting the challenges of remote collaboration. Your opinion will shape how you write your essay, so take some time to think about what you believe about remote work before you start writing.

Step 2: Write Your Thesis Statement

Once you've figured out what you think about the topic, it's time to write your thesis statement. This statement is like the main idea or argument of your essay.

If you believe that remote work offers significant benefits, your thesis statement might be: 'Remote work presents an opportunity for increased flexibility and work-life balance, benefiting employees and employers alike in today's interconnected world.'

Alternatively, if you believe that remote work has notable drawbacks, your thesis statement might be: 'While remote work offers flexibility, it can also lead to feelings of isolation and challenges in collaboration, necessitating a balanced approach to its implementation.'

Your thesis statement guides the rest of your analytical essay, so make sure it clearly expresses your viewpoint on the benefits and drawbacks of remote work.

Step 3: Write Topic Sentences

After you have your thesis statement about the benefits and drawbacks of remote work, you need to come up with topic sentences for each paragraph while writing an analytical essay. These sentences introduce the main point of each paragraph and help to structure your essay.

Let's say your first paragraph is about the benefits of remote work. Your topic sentence might be: 'Remote work offers employees increased flexibility and autonomy, enabling them to better manage their work-life balance.'

For the next paragraph discussing the drawbacks of remote work, your topic sentence could be: 'However, remote work can also lead to feelings of isolation and difficulties in communication and collaboration with colleagues.'

And for the paragraph about potential solutions to the challenges of remote work, your topic sentence might be: 'To mitigate the drawbacks of remote work, companies can implement strategies such as regular check-ins, virtual team-building activities, and flexible work arrangements.'

Each topic sentence should relate back to your thesis statement about the benefits and drawbacks of remote work and provide a clear focus for the paragraph that follows.

Step 4: Create an Outline

Now that you have your thesis statement and topic sentences, it's time to create an analytical essay outline to ensure your essay flows logically. Here's an outline prepared by our analytical essay writer based on the example of discussing the benefits and drawbacks of remote work:

Step 5: Write Your First Draft

Now that you have your outline, it's time to start writing your first draft. Begin by expanding upon each point in your outline, making sure to connect your ideas smoothly and logically. Don't worry too much about perfection at this stage; the goal is to get your ideas down on paper. You can always revise and polish your draft later.

As you write, keep referring back to your thesis statement to ensure that your arguments align with your main argument. Additionally, make sure each paragraph flows naturally into the next, maintaining coherence throughout your essay.

Once you've completed your first draft, take a break and then come back to review and revise it. Look for areas where you can strengthen your arguments, clarify your points, and improve the overall structure and flow of your essay.

Remember, writing is a process, and it's okay to go through multiple drafts before you're satisfied with the final result. Take your time and be patient with yourself as you work towards creating a well-crafted essay on the benefits and drawbacks of remote work.

Step 6: Revise and Proofread

Once you've completed your first draft, it's essential to revise and proofread your essay to ensure clarity, coherence, and correctness. Here's how to approach this step:

• Check if your ideas make sense and if they support your main point.
• Make sure your writing style stays the same and your format follows the rules.
• Double-check your facts and make sure you've covered everything important.
• Cut out any extra words and make your sentences clear and short.
• Look for mistakes in spelling and grammar.
• Ask someone to read your essay and give you feedback.

What is the Purpose of an Analytical Essay?

Analytical essays aim to analyze texts or topics, presenting a clear argument. They deepen understanding by evaluating evidence and uncovering underlying meanings. These essays promote critical thinking, challenging readers to consider different viewpoints.

They're also great for improving critical thinking skills. By breaking down complex ideas and presenting them clearly, they encourage readers to think for themselves and reach their own conclusions.

This type of essay also adds to academic discussions by offering fresh insights. By analyzing existing research and literature, they bring new perspectives or shine a light on overlooked parts of a topic. This keeps academic conversations lively and encourages more exploration in the field.

Analytical Essay Examples

Check out our essay samples to see theory in action. Crafted by our dissertation services , they show how analytical thinking applies to real situations, helping you understand concepts better.

With our tips on how to write an analytical essay, you're ready to boost your writing skills and craft essays that captivate your audience. With practice, you'll become a pro at analytical writing, ready to tackle any topic with confidence. And, if you need help to buy essay online , just drop us a line saying ' do my homework for me ' and we'll jump right in!

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is a seasoned educational writer focusing on scholarship guidance, research papers, and various forms of academic essays including reflective and narrative essays. His expertise also extends to detailed case studies. A scholar with a background in English Literature and Education, Daniel’s work on EssayPro blog aims to support students in achieving academic excellence and securing scholarships. His hobbies include reading classic literature and participating in academic forums.

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beginner's guide to literary analysis

Understanding literature & how to write literary analysis.

Literary analysis is the foundation of every college and high school English class. Once you can comprehend written work and respond to it, the next step is to learn how to think critically and complexly about a work of literature in order to analyze its elements and establish ideas about its meaning.

If that sounds daunting, it shouldn’t. Literary analysis is really just a way of thinking creatively about what you read. The practice takes you beyond the storyline and into the motives behind it. 

While an author might have had a specific intention when they wrote their book, there’s still no right or wrong way to analyze a literary text—just your way. You can use literary theories, which act as “lenses” through which you can view a text. Or you can use your own creativity and critical thinking to identify a literary device or pattern in a text and weave that insight into your own argument about the text’s underlying meaning. 

Now, if that sounds fun, it should , because it is. Here, we’ll lay the groundwork for performing literary analysis, including when writing analytical essays, to help you read books like a critic. 

What Is Literary Analysis?

As the name suggests, literary analysis is an analysis of a work, whether that’s a novel, play, short story, or poem. Any analysis requires breaking the content into its component parts and then examining how those parts operate independently and as a whole. In literary analysis, those parts can be different devices and elements—such as plot, setting, themes, symbols, etcetera—as well as elements of style, like point of view or tone. 

When performing analysis, you consider some of these different elements of the text and then form an argument for why the author chose to use them. You can do so while reading and during class discussion, but it’s particularly important when writing essays. 

Literary analysis is notably distinct from summary. When you write a summary , you efficiently describe the work’s main ideas or plot points in order to establish an overview of the work. While you might use elements of summary when writing analysis, you should do so minimally. You can reference a plot line to make a point, but it should be done so quickly so you can focus on why that plot line matters . In summary (see what we did there?), a summary focuses on the “ what ” of a text, while analysis turns attention to the “ how ” and “ why .”

While literary analysis can be broad, covering themes across an entire work, it can also be very specific, and sometimes the best analysis is just that. Literary critics have written thousands of words about the meaning of an author’s single word choice; while you might not want to be quite that particular, there’s a lot to be said for digging deep in literary analysis, rather than wide. 

Although you’re forming your own argument about the work, it’s not your opinion . You should avoid passing judgment on the piece and instead objectively consider what the author intended, how they went about executing it, and whether or not they were successful in doing so. Literary criticism is similar to literary analysis, but it is different in that it does pass judgement on the work. Criticism can also consider literature more broadly, without focusing on a singular work. 

Once you understand what constitutes (and doesn’t constitute) literary analysis, it’s easy to identify it. Here are some examples of literary analysis and its oft-confused counterparts: 

Summary: In “The Fall of the House of Usher,” the narrator visits his friend Roderick Usher and witnesses his sister escape a horrible fate.  

Opinion: In “The Fall of the House of Usher,” Poe uses his great Gothic writing to establish a sense of spookiness that is enjoyable to read. 

Literary Analysis: “Throughout ‘The Fall of the House of Usher,’ Poe foreshadows the fate of Madeline by creating a sense of claustrophobia for the reader through symbols, such as in the narrator’s inability to leave and the labyrinthine nature of the house. 

In summary, literary analysis is:

• Breaking a work into its components
• Identifying what those components are and how they work in the text
• Developing an understanding of how they work together to achieve a goal 
• Not an opinion, but subjective 
• Not a summary, though summary can be used in passing 
• Best when it deeply, rather than broadly, analyzes a literary element

Literary Analysis and Other Works

As discussed above, literary analysis is often performed upon a single work—but it doesn’t have to be. It can also be performed across works to consider the interplay of two or more texts. Regardless of whether or not the works were written about the same thing, or even within the same time period, they can have an influence on one another or a connection that’s worth exploring. And reading two or more texts side by side can help you to develop insights through comparison and contrast.

For example, Paradise Lost is an epic poem written in the 17th century, based largely on biblical narratives written some 700 years before and which later influenced 19th century poet John Keats. The interplay of works can be obvious, as here, or entirely the inspiration of the analyst. As an example of the latter, you could compare and contrast the writing styles of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Edgar Allan Poe who, while contemporaries in terms of time, were vastly different in their content. 

Additionally, literary analysis can be performed between a work and its context. Authors are often speaking to the larger context of their times, be that social, political, religious, economic, or artistic. A valid and interesting form is to compare the author’s context to the work, which is done by identifying and analyzing elements that are used to make an argument about the writer’s time or experience. 

For example, you could write an essay about how Hemingway’s struggles with mental health and paranoia influenced his later work, or how his involvement in the Spanish Civil War influenced his early work. One approach focuses more on his personal experience, while the other turns to the context of his times—both are valid. 

Why Does Literary Analysis Matter? 

Sometimes an author wrote a work of literature strictly for entertainment’s sake, but more often than not, they meant something more. Whether that was a missive on world peace, commentary about femininity, or an allusion to their experience as an only child, the author probably wrote their work for a reason, and understanding that reason—or the many reasons—can actually make reading a lot more meaningful. 

Performing literary analysis as a form of study unquestionably makes you a better reader. It’s also likely that it will improve other skills, too, like critical thinking, creativity, debate, and reasoning. 

At its grandest and most idealistic, literary analysis even has the ability to make the world a better place. By reading and analyzing works of literature, you are able to more fully comprehend the perspectives of others. Cumulatively, you’ll broaden your own perspectives and contribute more effectively to the things that matter to you. 

Literary Terms to Know for Literary Analysis 

There are hundreds of literary devices you could consider during your literary analysis, but there are some key tools most writers utilize to achieve their purpose—and therefore you need to know in order to understand that purpose. These common devices include: 

• Characters: The people (or entities) who play roles in the work. The protagonist is the main character in the work. 
• Conflict: The conflict is the driving force behind the plot, the event that causes action in the narrative, usually on the part of the protagonist
• Context : The broader circumstances surrounding the work political and social climate in which it was written or the experience of the author. It can also refer to internal context, and the details presented by the narrator 
• Diction : The word choice used by the narrator or characters 
• Genre: A category of literature characterized by agreed upon similarities in the works, such as subject matter and tone
• Imagery : The descriptive or figurative language used to paint a picture in the reader’s mind so they can picture the story’s plot, characters, and setting 
• Metaphor: A figure of speech that uses comparison between two unlike objects for dramatic or poetic effect
• Narrator: The person who tells the story. Sometimes they are a character within the story, but sometimes they are omniscient and removed from the plot. 
• Plot : The storyline of the work
• Point of view: The perspective taken by the narrator, which skews the perspective of the reader 
• Setting : The time and place in which the story takes place. This can include elements like the time period, weather, time of year or day, and social or economic conditions 
• Symbol : An object, person, or place that represents an abstract idea that is greater than its literal meaning 
• Syntax : The structure of a sentence, either narration or dialogue, and the tone it implies
• Theme : A recurring subject or message within the work, often commentary on larger societal or cultural ideas
• Tone : The feeling, attitude, or mood the text presents

How to Perform Literary Analysis

Step 1: read the text thoroughly.

Literary analysis begins with the literature itself, which means performing a close reading of the text. As you read, you should focus on the work. That means putting away distractions (sorry, smartphone) and dedicating a period of time to the task at hand. 

It’s also important that you don’t skim or speed read. While those are helpful skills, they don’t apply to literary analysis—or at least not this stage. 

Step 2: Take Notes as You Read  

As you read the work, take notes about different literary elements and devices that stand out to you. Whether you highlight or underline in text, use sticky note tabs to mark pages and passages, or handwrite your thoughts in a notebook, you should capture your thoughts and the parts of the text to which they correspond. This—the act of noticing things about a literary work—is literary analysis. 

Step 3: Notice Patterns 

As you read the work, you’ll begin to notice patterns in the way the author deploys language, themes, and symbols to build their plot and characters. As you read and these patterns take shape, begin to consider what they could mean and how they might fit together. 

As you identify these patterns, as well as other elements that catch your interest, be sure to record them in your notes or text. Some examples include: 

• Circle or underline words or terms that you notice the author uses frequently, whether those are nouns (like “eyes” or “road”) or adjectives (like “yellow” or “lush”).
• Highlight phrases that give you the same kind of feeling. For example, if the narrator describes an “overcast sky,” a “dreary morning,” and a “dark, quiet room,” the words aren’t the same, but the feeling they impart and setting they develop are similar. 
• Underline quotes or prose that define a character’s personality or their role in the text.
• Use sticky tabs to color code different elements of the text, such as specific settings or a shift in the point of view. 

By noting these patterns, comprehensive symbols, metaphors, and ideas will begin to come into focus.  

Step 4: Consider the Work as a Whole, and Ask Questions

This is a step that you can do either as you read, or after you finish the text. The point is to begin to identify the aspects of the work that most interest you, and you could therefore analyze in writing or discussion. 

Questions you could ask yourself include: 

• What aspects of the text do I not understand?
• What parts of the narrative or writing struck me most?
• What patterns did I notice?
• What did the author accomplish really well?
• What did I find lacking?
• Did I notice any contradictions or anything that felt out of place?  
• What was the purpose of the minor characters?
• What tone did the author choose, and why? 

The answers to these and more questions will lead you to your arguments about the text. 

Step 5: Return to Your Notes and the Text for Evidence

As you identify the argument you want to make (especially if you’re preparing for an essay), return to your notes to see if you already have supporting evidence for your argument. That’s why it’s so important to take notes or mark passages as you read—you’ll thank yourself later!

If you’re preparing to write an essay, you’ll use these passages and ideas to bolster your argument—aka, your thesis. There will likely be multiple different passages you can use to strengthen multiple different aspects of your argument. Just be sure to cite the text correctly! 

If you’re preparing for class, your notes will also be invaluable. When your teacher or professor leads the conversation in the direction of your ideas or arguments, you’ll be able to not only proffer that idea but back it up with textual evidence. That’s an A+ in class participation. 

Step 6: Connect These Ideas Across the Narrative

Whether you’re in class or writing an essay, literary analysis isn’t complete until you’ve considered the way these ideas interact and contribute to the work as a whole. You can find and present evidence, but you still have to explain how those elements work together and make up your argument. 

How to Write a Literary Analysis Essay

When conducting literary analysis while reading a text or discussing it in class, you can pivot easily from one argument to another (or even switch sides if a classmate or teacher makes a compelling enough argument). 

But when writing literary analysis, your objective is to propose a specific, arguable thesis and convincingly defend it. In order to do so, you need to fortify your argument with evidence from the text (and perhaps secondary sources) and an authoritative tone. 

A successful literary analysis essay depends equally on a thoughtful thesis, supportive analysis, and presenting these elements masterfully. We’ll review how to accomplish these objectives below. 

Step 1: Read the Text. Maybe Read It Again. 

Constructing an astute analytical essay requires a thorough knowledge of the text. As you read, be sure to note any passages, quotes, or ideas that stand out. These could serve as the future foundation of your thesis statement. Noting these sections now will help you when you need to gather evidence. 

The more familiar you become with the text, the better (and easier!) your essay will be. Familiarity with the text allows you to speak (or in this case, write) to it confidently. If you only skim the book, your lack of rich understanding will be evident in your essay. Alternatively, if you read the text closely—especially if you read it more than once, or at least carefully revisit important passages—your own writing will be filled with insight that goes beyond a basic understanding of the storyline. 

Step 2: Brainstorm Potential Topics 

Because you took detailed notes while reading the text, you should have a list of potential topics at the ready. Take time to review your notes, highlighting any ideas or questions you had that feel interesting. You should also return to the text and look for any passages that stand out to you. 

When considering potential topics, you should prioritize ideas that you find interesting. It won’t only make the whole process of writing an essay more fun, your enthusiasm for the topic will probably improve the quality of your argument, and maybe even your writing. Just like it’s obvious when a topic interests you in a conversation, it’s obvious when a topic interests the writer of an essay (and even more obvious when it doesn’t). 

Your topic ideas should also be specific, unique, and arguable. A good way to think of topics is that they’re the answer to fairly specific questions. As you begin to brainstorm, first think of questions you have about the text. Questions might focus on the plot, such as: Why did the author choose to deviate from the projected storyline? Or why did a character’s role in the narrative shift? Questions might also consider the use of a literary device, such as: Why does the narrator frequently repeat a phrase or comment on a symbol? Or why did the author choose to switch points of view each chapter? 

Once you have a thesis question , you can begin brainstorming answers—aka, potential thesis statements . At this point, your answers can be fairly broad. Once you land on a question-statement combination that feels right, you’ll then look for evidence in the text that supports your answer (and helps you define and narrow your thesis statement). 

For example, after reading “ The Fall of the House of Usher ,” you might be wondering, Why are Roderick and Madeline twins?, Or even: Why does their relationship feel so creepy?” Maybe you noticed (and noted) that the narrator was surprised to find out they were twins, or perhaps you found that the narrator’s tone tended to shift and become more anxious when discussing the interactions of the twins.

Once you come up with your thesis question, you can identify a broad answer, which will become the basis for your thesis statement. In response to the questions above, your answer might be, “Poe emphasizes the close relationship of Roderick and Madeline to foreshadow that their deaths will be close, too.” 

Step 3: Gather Evidence 

Once you have your topic (or you’ve narrowed it down to two or three), return to the text (yes, again) to see what evidence you can find to support it. If you’re thinking of writing about the relationship between Roderick and Madeline in “The Fall of the House of Usher,” look for instances where they engaged in the text. 

This is when your knowledge of literary devices comes in clutch. Carefully study the language around each event in the text that might be relevant to your topic. How does Poe’s diction or syntax change during the interactions of the siblings? How does the setting reflect or contribute to their relationship? What imagery or symbols appear when Roderick and Madeline are together? 

By finding and studying evidence within the text, you’ll strengthen your topic argument—or, just as valuably, discount the topics that aren’t strong enough for analysis. 

Step 4: Consider Secondary Sources 

In addition to returning to the literary work you’re studying for evidence, you can also consider secondary sources that reference or speak to the work. These can be articles from journals you find on JSTOR, books that consider the work or its context, or articles your teacher shared in class. 

While you can use these secondary sources to further support your idea, you should not overuse them. Make sure your topic remains entirely differentiated from that presented in the source. 

Step 5: Write a Working Thesis Statement

Once you’ve gathered evidence and narrowed down your topic, you’re ready to refine that topic into a thesis statement. As you continue to outline and write your paper, this thesis statement will likely change slightly, but this initial draft will serve as the foundation of your essay. It’s like your north star: Everything you write in your essay is leading you back to your thesis. 

Writing a great thesis statement requires some real finesse. A successful thesis statement is: 

• Debatable : You shouldn’t simply summarize or make an obvious statement about the work. Instead, your thesis statement should take a stand on an issue or make a claim that is open to argument. You’ll spend your essay debating—and proving—your argument. 
• Demonstrable : You need to be able to prove, through evidence, that your thesis statement is true. That means you have to have passages from the text and correlative analysis ready to convince the reader that you’re right. 
• Specific : In most cases, successfully addressing a theme that encompasses a work in its entirety would require a book-length essay. Instead, identify a thesis statement that addresses specific elements of the work, such as a relationship between characters, a repeating symbol, a key setting, or even something really specific like the speaking style of a character. 

Example: By depicting the relationship between Roderick and Madeline to be stifling and almost otherworldly in its closeness, Poe foreshadows both Madeline’s fate and Roderick’s inability to choose a different fate for himself. 

Step 6: Write an Outline 

You have your thesis, you have your evidence—but how do you put them together? A great thesis statement (and therefore a great essay) will have multiple arguments supporting it, presenting different kinds of evidence that all contribute to the singular, main idea presented in your thesis. 

Review your evidence and identify these different arguments, then organize the evidence into categories based on the argument they support. These ideas and evidence will become the body paragraphs of your essay. 

For example, if you were writing about Roderick and Madeline as in the example above, you would pull evidence from the text, such as the narrator’s realization of their relationship as twins; examples where the narrator’s tone of voice shifts when discussing their relationship; imagery, like the sounds Roderick hears as Madeline tries to escape; and Poe’s tendency to use doubles and twins in his other writings to create the same spooky effect. All of these are separate strains of the same argument, and can be clearly organized into sections of an outline. 

Step 7: Write Your Introduction

Your introduction serves a few very important purposes that essentially set the scene for the reader: 

• Establish context. Sure, your reader has probably read the work. But you still want to remind them of the scene, characters, or elements you’ll be discussing. 
• Present your thesis statement. Your thesis statement is the backbone of your analytical paper. You need to present it clearly at the outset so that the reader understands what every argument you make is aimed at. 
• Offer a mini-outline. While you don’t want to show all your cards just yet, you do want to preview some of the evidence you’ll be using to support your thesis so that the reader has a roadmap of where they’re going. 

Step 8: Write Your Body Paragraphs

Thanks to steps one through seven, you’ve already set yourself up for success. You have clearly outlined arguments and evidence to support them. Now it’s time to translate those into authoritative and confident prose. 

When presenting each idea, begin with a topic sentence that encapsulates the argument you’re about to make (sort of like a mini-thesis statement). Then present your evidence and explanations of that evidence that contribute to that argument. Present enough material to prove your point, but don’t feel like you necessarily have to point out every single instance in the text where this element takes place. For example, if you’re highlighting a symbol that repeats throughout the narrative, choose two or three passages where it is used most effectively, rather than trying to squeeze in all ten times it appears. 

While you should have clearly defined arguments, the essay should still move logically and fluidly from one argument to the next. Try to avoid choppy paragraphs that feel disjointed; every idea and argument should feel connected to the last, and, as a group, connected to your thesis. A great way to connect the ideas from one paragraph to the next is with transition words and phrases, such as: 

• Furthermore 
• In addition
• On the other hand
• Conversely 

Step 9: Write Your Conclusion 

Your conclusion is more than a summary of your essay's parts, but it’s also not a place to present brand new ideas not already discussed in your essay. Instead, your conclusion should return to your thesis (without repeating it verbatim) and point to why this all matters. If writing about the siblings in “The Fall of the House of Usher,” for example, you could point out that the utilization of twins and doubles is a common literary element of Poe’s work that contributes to the definitive eeriness of Gothic literature. 

While you might speak to larger ideas in your conclusion, be wary of getting too macro. Your conclusion should still be supported by all of the ideas that preceded it. 

Step 10: Revise, Revise, Revise

Of course you should proofread your literary analysis essay before you turn it in. But you should also edit the content to make sure every piece of evidence and every explanation directly supports your thesis as effectively and efficiently as possible. 

Sometimes, this might mean actually adapting your thesis a bit to the rest of your essay. At other times, it means removing redundant examples or paraphrasing quotations. Make sure every sentence is valuable, and remove those that aren’t. 

Other Resources for Literary Analysis 

With these skills and suggestions, you’re well on your way to practicing and writing literary analysis. But if you don’t have a firm grasp on the concepts discussed above—such as literary devices or even the content of the text you’re analyzing—it will still feel difficult to produce insightful analysis. 

If you’d like to sharpen the tools in your literature toolbox, there are plenty of other resources to help you do so: 

• Check out our expansive library of Literary Devices . These could provide you with a deeper understanding of the basic devices discussed above or introduce you to new concepts sure to impress your professors ( anagnorisis , anyone?). 
• This Academic Citation Resource Guide ensures you properly cite any work you reference in your analytical essay. 
• Our English Homework Help Guide will point you to dozens of resources that can help you perform analysis, from critical reading strategies to poetry helpers. 
• This Grammar Education Resource Guide will direct you to plenty of resources to refine your grammar and writing (definitely important for getting an A+ on that paper). 

Of course, you should know the text inside and out before you begin writing your analysis. In order to develop a true understanding of the work, read through its corresponding SuperSummary study guide . Doing so will help you truly comprehend the plot, as well as provide some inspirational ideas for your analysis.

• How it works

A Quick Guide to Textual Analysis – Definition & Steps

Published by Alvin Nicolas at August 16th, 2021 , Revised On August 29, 2023

Textual analysis is the method of analysing and understanding the text. It includes the close reading of fictional texts, images symbols, and all forms of written literary texts. A researcher needs to look keenly at the text to identify the writer’s context and its message.

What is a Text? 

• A text can be anything from which you can extract any meaning or information.
• A text can be a written book, records, journals, newspapers, magazines, ornaments, objects, emails, or transcribed conversations.
• It also includes analysing events, places, videos, images, or movies to get in-depth knowledge about its creation and purpose.

Why do we Call it a Text?

You might be thinking, why don’t we call it a book, video, or magazine? Why do we call it a  text ?

The word  text means the post-structuralist approach to thinking about the development of meaning.

The Purpose of Textual Analysis

The purpose of your textual analysis depends on the object of your analysis, such as:

• Analysis of a video or movie may aim to determine the target audience, dialogues, cinematography, visual and sound effects, and the message conveyed through his work.
• Analysis of texts and short stories focus on the language, narrative, choice of words, imagery, perception of the writer, and organisation of the text.
• You can analyse a monument based on its architectural history, stories related to it, and visitors’ navigation.
• You can analyse images in terms of the photographer’s creativity, use of a camera, sense of selecting locations, skills of capturing images, etc.
• You can analyse paintings in terms of their artistic level, use of colours, perception of the painters, the message hidden in the image, etc.

Confused between qualitative and quantitative methods of data analysis? No idea what discourse and content analysis are?

We hear you.

• Whether you want a full dissertation written or need help forming a dissertation proposal, we can help you with both.
• Get different dissertation services at ResearchProspect and score amazing grades!

Textual Analysis of Cultural and Media Studies

A researcher uses videos, social media content, newspapers, maps, buildings, advertisements, and images. Textual analysis plays a key role in the fields of cultural and media studies. A researcher aims to analyse, interpret, and analyse the controversial issues and messages embedded within the text and tries to connect them with other texts or events.

These kinds of texts are analysed from the following aspects:

• Content of the texts
• Language and word choice
• Elements of creativity
• Target audience
• Association with other texts or events

It focuses primarily on the creative and qualitative approach of the text. A researcher identifies the context and hidden message of the text.

Textual Analysis in the Social Sciences

It includes the textual analysis of the interview transcripts and surveys, and other media, including TV programs, chats, social media content. It takes a quantitative approach to measure the characteristics and organisation of the text. You can measure the text’s repetitions, types of colours displayed, tone of the speakers, etc.

Content analysis ,  thematic analysis , and  discourse analysis are the most frequent ways to analyse these texts.

Literary Text Analysis

The literary text analysis is breaking a text’s structure and content into smaller parts to seek in-depth understanding. A researcher It includes stories, poetry, plays, novels, plays, and books.

Also read about: Correlational research , a comprehensive guide on its types with examples

It focuses on identifying:

• The association between various individual texts.
• The similarities between the concepts of the two separate texts.
• The relationship between the texts and political, social, aesthetic, economic, or religious contexts.

Frequently Asked Questions

How to describe textual analysis.

Textual analysis examines written, visual, or spoken material to uncover layers of meaning, themes, and patterns. It dissects language, structure, and context to reveal how elements convey messages, ideologies, and cultural insights, often contributing to a deeper understanding of the content’s significance.

You May Also Like

A survey includes questions relevant to the research topic. The participants are selected, and the questionnaire is distributed to collect the data.

Descriptive research is carried out to describe current issues, programs, and provides information about the issue through surveys and various fact-finding methods.

A meta-analysis is a formal, epidemiological, quantitative study design that uses statistical methods to generalise the findings of the selected independent studies.

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12.14: Sample Student Literary Analysis Essays

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• Page ID 40514

• Heather Ringo & Athena Kashyap
• City College of San Francisco via ASCCC Open Educational Resources Initiative

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The following examples are essays where student writers focused on close-reading a literary work.

While reading these examples, ask yourself the following questions:

• What is the essay's thesis statement, and how do you know it is the thesis statement?
• What is the main idea or topic sentence of each body paragraph, and how does it relate back to the thesis statement?
• Where and how does each essay use evidence (quotes or paraphrase from the literature)?
• What are some of the literary devices or structures the essays analyze or discuss?
• How does each author structure their conclusion, and how does their conclusion differ from their introduction?

Example 1: Poetry

Victoria Morillo

Instructor Heather Ringo

3 August 2022

How Nguyen’s Structure Solidifies the Impact of Sexual Violence in “The Study”

Stripped of innocence, your body taken from you. No matter how much you try to block out the instance in which these two things occurred, memories surface and come back to haunt you. How does a person, a young boy , cope with an event that forever changes his life? Hieu Minh Nguyen deconstructs this very way in which an act of sexual violence affects a survivor. In his poem, “The Study,” the poem's speaker recounts the year in which his molestation took place, describing how his memory filters in and out. Throughout the poem, Nguyen writes in free verse, permitting a structural liberation to become the foundation for his message to shine through. While he moves the readers with this poignant narrative, Nguyen effectively conveys the resulting internal struggles of feeling alone and unseen.

The speaker recalls his experience with such painful memory through the use of specific punctuation choices. Just by looking at the poem, we see that the first period doesn’t appear until line 14. It finally comes after the speaker reveals to his readers the possible, central purpose for writing this poem: the speaker's molestation. In the first half, the poem makes use of commas, em dashes, and colons, which lends itself to the idea of the speaker stringing along all of these details to make sense of this time in his life. If reading the poem following the conventions of punctuation, a sense of urgency is present here, as well. This is exemplified by the lack of periods to finalize a thought; and instead, Nguyen uses other punctuation marks to connect them. Serving as another connector of thoughts, the two em dashes give emphasis to the role memory plays when the speaker discusses how “no one [had] a face” during that time (Nguyen 9-11). He speaks in this urgent manner until the 14th line, and when he finally gets it off his chest, the pace of the poem changes, as does the more frequent use of the period. This stream-of-consciousness-like section when juxtaposed with the latter half of the poem, causes readers to slow down and pay attention to the details. It also splits the poem in two: a section that talks of the fogginess of memory then transitions into one that remembers it all.

In tandem with the fluctuating nature of memory, the utilization of line breaks and word choice help reflect the damage the molestation has had. Within the first couple of lines of the poem, the poem demands the readers’ attention when the line breaks from “floating” to “dead” as the speaker describes his memory of Little Billy (Nguyen 1-4). This line break averts the readers’ expectation of the direction of the narrative and immediately shifts the tone of the poem. The break also speaks to the effect his trauma has ingrained in him and how “[f]or the longest time,” his only memory of that year revolves around an image of a boy’s death. In a way, the speaker sees himself in Little Billy; or perhaps, he’s representative of the tragic death of his boyhood, how the speaker felt so “dead” after enduring such a traumatic experience, even referring to himself as a “ghost” that he tries to evict from his conscience (Nguyen 24). The feeling that a part of him has died is solidified at the very end of the poem when the speaker describes himself as a nine-year-old boy who’s been “fossilized,” forever changed by this act (Nguyen 29). By choosing words associated with permanence and death, the speaker tries to recreate the atmosphere (for which he felt trapped in) in order for readers to understand the loneliness that came as a result of his trauma. With the assistance of line breaks, more attention is drawn to the speaker's words, intensifying their importance, and demanding to be felt by the readers.

Most importantly, the speaker expresses eloquently, and so heartbreakingly, about the effect sexual violence has on a person. Perhaps what seems to be the most frustrating are the people who fail to believe survivors of these types of crimes. This is evident when he describes “how angry” the tenants were when they filled the pool with cement (Nguyen 4). They seem to represent how people in the speaker's life were dismissive of his assault and who viewed his tragedy as a nuisance of some sorts. This sentiment is bookended when he says, “They say, give us details , so I give them my body. / They say, give us proof , so I give them my body,” (Nguyen 25-26). The repetition of these two lines reinforces the feeling many feel in these scenarios, as they’re often left to deal with trying to make people believe them, or to even see them.

It’s important to recognize how the structure of this poem gives the speaker space to express the pain he’s had to carry for so long. As a characteristic of free verse, the poem doesn’t follow any structured rhyme scheme or meter; which in turn, allows him to not have any constraints in telling his story the way he wants to. The speaker has the freedom to display his experience in a way that evades predictability and engenders authenticity of a story very personal to him. As readers, we abandon anticipating the next rhyme, and instead focus our attention to the other ways, like his punctuation or word choice, in which he effectively tells his story. The speaker recognizes that some part of him no longer belongs to himself, but by writing “The Study,” he shows other survivors that they’re not alone and encourages hope that eventually, they will be freed from the shackles of sexual violence.

Works Cited

Nguyen, Hieu Minh. “The Study” Poets.Org. Academy of American Poets, Coffee House Press, 2018, https://poets.org/poem/study-0 .

Example 2: Fiction

Todd Goodwin

Professor Stan Matyshak

Advanced Expository Writing

Sept. 17, 20—

Poe’s “Usher”: A Mirror of the Fall of the House of Humanity

Right from the outset of the grim story, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” Edgar Allan Poe enmeshes us in a dark, gloomy, hopeless world, alienating his characters and the reader from any sort of physical or psychological norm where such values as hope and happiness could possibly exist. He fatalistically tells the story of how a man (the narrator) comes from the outside world of hope, religion, and everyday society and tries to bring some kind of redeeming happiness to his boyhood friend, Roderick Usher, who not only has physically and psychologically wasted away but is entrapped in a dilapidated house of ever-looming terror with an emaciated and deranged twin sister. Roderick Usher embodies the wasting away of what once was vibrant and alive, and his house of “insufferable gloom” (273), which contains his morbid sister, seems to mirror or reflect this fear of death and annihilation that he most horribly endures. A close reading of the story reveals that Poe uses mirror images, or reflections, to contribute to the fatalistic theme of “Usher”: each reflection serves to intensify an already prevalent tone of hopelessness, darkness, and fatalism.

It could be argued that the house of Roderick Usher is a “house of mirrors,” whose unpleasant and grim reflections create a dark and hopeless setting. For example, the narrator first approaches “the melancholy house of Usher on a dark and soundless day,” and finds a building which causes him a “sense of insufferable gloom,” which “pervades his spirit and causes an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart, an undiscerned dreariness of thought” (273). The narrator then optimistically states: “I reflected that a mere different arrangement of the scene, of the details of the picture, would be sufficient to modify, or perhaps annihilate its capacity for sorrowful impression” (274). But the narrator then sees the reflection of the house in the tarn and experiences a “shudder even more thrilling than before” (274). Thus the reader begins to realize that the narrator cannot change or stop the impending doom that will befall the house of Usher, and maybe humanity. The story cleverly plays with the word reflection : the narrator sees a physical reflection that leads him to a mental reflection about Usher’s surroundings.

The narrator’s disillusionment by such grim reflection continues in the story. For example, he describes Roderick Usher’s face as distinct with signs of old strength but lost vigor: the remains of what used to be. He describes the house as a once happy and vibrant place, which, like Roderick, lost its vitality. Also, the narrator describes Usher’s hair as growing wild on his rather obtrusive head, which directly mirrors the eerie moss and straw covering the outside of the house. The narrator continually longs to see these bleak reflections as a dream, for he states: “Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building” (276). He does not want to face the reality that Usher and his home are doomed to fall, regardless of what he does.

Although there are almost countless examples of these mirror images, two others stand out as important. First, Roderick and his sister, Madeline, are twins. The narrator aptly states just as he and Roderick are entombing Madeline that there is “a striking similitude between brother and sister” (288). Indeed, they are mirror images of each other. Madeline is fading away psychologically and physically, and Roderick is not too far behind! The reflection of “doom” that these two share helps intensify and symbolize the hopelessness of the entire situation; thus, they further develop the fatalistic theme. Second, in the climactic scene where Madeline has been mistakenly entombed alive, there is a pairing of images and sounds as the narrator tries to calm Roderick by reading him a romance story. Events in the story simultaneously unfold with events of the sister escaping her tomb. In the story, the hero breaks out of the coffin. Then, in the story, the dragon’s shriek as he is slain parallels Madeline’s shriek. Finally, the story tells of the clangor of a shield, matched by the sister’s clanging along a metal passageway. As the suspense reaches its climax, Roderick shrieks his last words to his “friend,” the narrator: “Madman! I tell you that she now stands without the door” (296).

Roderick, who slowly falls into insanity, ironically calls the narrator the “Madman.” We are left to reflect on what Poe means by this ironic twist. Poe’s bleak and dark imagery, and his use of mirror reflections, seem only to intensify the hopelessness of “Usher.” We can plausibly conclude that, indeed, the narrator is the “Madman,” for he comes from everyday society, which is a place where hope and faith exist. Poe would probably argue that such a place is opposite to the world of Usher because a world where death is inevitable could not possibly hold such positive values. Therefore, just as Roderick mirrors his sister, the reflection in the tarn mirrors the dilapidation of the house, and the story mirrors the final actions before the death of Usher. “The Fall of the House of Usher” reflects Poe’s view that humanity is hopelessly doomed.

Poe, Edgar Allan. “The Fall of the House of Usher.” 1839. Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia Library . 1995. Web. 1 July 2012. < http://etext.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/PoeFall.html >.

Example 3: Poetry

Amy Chisnell

Professor Laura Neary

Writing and Literature

April 17, 20—

Don’t Listen to the Egg!: A Close Reading of Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky”

“You seem very clever at explaining words, Sir,” said Alice. “Would you kindly tell me the meaning of the poem called ‘Jabberwocky’?”

“Let’s hear it,” said Humpty Dumpty. “I can explain all the poems that ever were invented—and a good many that haven’t been invented just yet.” (Carroll 164)

In Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass , Humpty Dumpty confidently translates (to a not so confident Alice) the complicated language of the poem “Jabberwocky.” The words of the poem, though nonsense, aptly tell the story of the slaying of the Jabberwock. Upon finding “Jabberwocky” on a table in the looking-glass room, Alice is confused by the strange words. She is quite certain that “ somebody killed something ,” but she does not understand much more than that. When later she encounters Humpty Dumpty, she seizes the opportunity at having the knowledgeable egg interpret—or translate—the poem. Since Humpty Dumpty professes to be able to “make a word work” for him, he is quick to agree. Thus he acts like a New Critic who interprets the poem by performing a close reading of it. Through Humpty’s interpretation of the first stanza, however, we see the poem’s deeper comment concerning the practice of interpreting poetry and literature in general—that strict analytical translation destroys the beauty of a poem. In fact, Humpty Dumpty commits the “heresy of paraphrase,” for he fails to understand that meaning cannot be separated from the form or structure of the literary work.

Of the 71 words found in “Jabberwocky,” 43 have no known meaning. They are simply nonsense. Yet through this nonsensical language, the poem manages not only to tell a story but also gives the reader a sense of setting and characterization. One feels, rather than concretely knows, that the setting is dark, wooded, and frightening. The characters, such as the Jubjub bird, the Bandersnatch, and the doomed Jabberwock, also appear in the reader’s head, even though they will not be found in the local zoo. Even though most of the words are not real, the reader is able to understand what goes on because he or she is given free license to imagine what the words denote and connote. Simply, the poem’s nonsense words are the meaning.

Therefore, when Humpty interprets “Jabberwocky” for Alice, he is not doing her any favors, for he actually misreads the poem. Although the poem in its original is constructed from nonsense words, by the time Humpty is done interpreting it, it truly does not make any sense. The first stanza of the original poem is as follows:

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;

All mimsy were the borogroves,

An the mome raths outgrabe. (Carroll 164)

If we replace, however, the nonsense words of “Jabberwocky” with Humpty’s translated words, the effect would be something like this:

’Twas four o’clock in the afternoon, and the lithe and slimy badger-lizard-corkscrew creatures

Did go round and round and make holes in the grass-plot round the sun-dial:

All flimsy and miserable were the shabby-looking birds

with mop feathers,

And the lost green pigs bellowed-sneezed-whistled.

By translating the poem in such a way, Humpty removes the charm or essence—and the beauty, grace, and rhythm—from the poem. The poetry is sacrificed for meaning. Humpty Dumpty commits the heresy of paraphrase. As Cleanth Brooks argues, “The structure of a poem resembles that of a ballet or musical composition. It is a pattern of resolutions and balances and harmonizations” (203). When the poem is left as nonsense, the reader can easily imagine what a “slithy tove” might be, but when Humpty tells us what it is, he takes that imaginative license away from the reader. The beauty (if that is the proper word) of “Jabberwocky” is in not knowing what the words mean, and yet understanding. By translating the poem, Humpty takes that privilege from the reader. In addition, Humpty fails to recognize that meaning cannot be separated from the structure itself: the nonsense poem reflects this literally—it means “nothing” and achieves this meaning by using “nonsense” words.

Furthermore, the nonsense words Carroll chooses to use in “Jabberwocky” have a magical effect upon the reader; the shadowy sound of the words create the atmosphere, which may be described as a trance-like mood. When Alice first reads the poem, she says it seems to fill her head “with ideas.” The strange-sounding words in the original poem do give one ideas. Why is this? Even though the reader has never heard these words before, he or she is instantly aware of the murky, mysterious mood they set. In other words, diction operates not on the denotative level (the dictionary meaning) but on the connotative level (the emotion(s) they evoke). Thus “Jabberwocky” creates a shadowy mood, and the nonsense words are instrumental in creating this mood. Carroll could not have simply used any nonsense words.

For example, let us change the “dark,” “ominous” words of the first stanza to “lighter,” more “comic” words:

’Twas mearly, and the churly pells

Did bimble and ringle in the tink;

All timpy were the brimbledimps,

And the bip plips outlink.

Shifting the sounds of the words from dark to light merely takes a shift in thought. To create a specific mood using nonsense words, one must create new words from old words that convey the desired mood. In “Jabberwocky,” Carroll mixes “slimy,” a grim idea, “lithe,” a pliable image, to get a new adjective: “slithy” (a portmanteau word). In this translation, brighter words were used to get a lighter effect. “Mearly” is a combination of “morning” and “early,” and “ringle” is a blend of “ring” and "dingle.” The point is that “Jabberwocky’s” nonsense words are created specifically to convey this shadowy or mysterious mood and are integral to the “meaning.”

Consequently, Humpty’s rendering of the poem leaves the reader with a completely different feeling than does the original poem, which provided us with a sense of ethereal mystery, of a dark and foreign land with exotic creatures and fantastic settings. The mysteriousness is destroyed by Humpty’s literal paraphrase of the creatures and the setting; by doing so, he has taken the beauty away from the poem in his attempt to understand it. He has committed the heresy of paraphrase: “If we allow ourselves to be misled by it [this heresy], we distort the relation of the poem to its ‘truth’… we split the poem between its ‘form’ and its ‘content’” (Brooks 201). Humpty Dumpty’s ultimate demise might be seen to symbolize the heretical split between form and content: as a literary creation, Humpty Dumpty is an egg, a well-wrought urn of nonsense. His fall from the wall cracks him and separates the contents from the container, and not even all the King’s men can put the scrambled egg back together again!

Through the odd characters of a little girl and a foolish egg, “Jabberwocky” suggests a bit of sage advice about reading poetry, advice that the New Critics built their theories on. The importance lies not solely within strict analytical translation or interpretation, but in the overall effect of the imagery and word choice that evokes a meaning inseparable from those literary devices. As Archibald MacLeish so aptly writes: “A poem should not mean / But be.” Sometimes it takes a little nonsense to show us the sense in something.

Brooks, Cleanth. The Well-Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure of Poetry . 1942. San Diego: Harcourt Brace, 1956. Print.

Carroll, Lewis. Through the Looking-Glass. Alice in Wonderland . 2nd ed. Ed. Donald J. Gray. New York: Norton, 1992. Print.

MacLeish, Archibald. “Ars Poetica.” The Oxford Book of American Poetry . Ed. David Lehman. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2006. 385–86. Print.

Attribution

• Sample Essay 1 received permission from Victoria Morillo to publish, licensed Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International ( CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 )
• Sample Essays 2 and 3 adapted from Cordell, Ryan and John Pennington. "2.5: Student Sample Papers" from Creating Literary Analysis. 2012. Licensed Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported ( CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 )

How to Write a Literary Analysis Essay Step by Step

So, you’ve been assigned a literary analysis essay. Don’t panic! It’s not a big deal, for sure. Here’s a simple step-by-step guide to help you ace it:

1. Understand the Prompt

Recognizing that identifying the main topic and simply reading through the given instructions is the essential first step to writing an outstanding essay. You should first carefully read the given sentences which include verbs like “analyze,” “discuss,” or “explore.”

It points out that your professor is specifically interested in a particular element of the text, maybe a theme, character or some kind of literary device. Thus, this approach will spare any misinterpretation through highlighting the most critical points of the job and how it is to be executed.

If you struggle with understanding the prompt, ask for help today at the quick essay writing service FastEssay . You may ask academic writers to explain to you how to write such papers quickly and easily.

2. Select the Literary Work

Everything begins with the right story, absolutely! Pick a work that is not just a part of your arsenal of knowledge but also something that you like. The second essay is a genre(e.g., novel, short story, poetry or drama) that can be focused on. The fact that you will apply the ingredients: it will not only increase the interest in the students but also create curiosity and will turn this process into a more interesting and challenging one.

3. Read and Re-read

Decision having been made, you must plunge yourself into the text. Close your eyes, and imagine the reality of the novel, where you are one of the characters yourself, or the place they are in, or the events that have happened, or the language they use. Consider doing things slowly instead of in fast mode.Study the text carefully. The probability is, you are going to get the deeper meaning and the linkages that you might have missed in the first reading when you read the text several times.

4. Identify the Thesis

Your thesis is the heart of your literary analysis essay—it is the core argument you will advance based on the text. Spend some time to come up with a thesis statement, after which you can begin your brainstorming. It should be relevant, concise, and specific either by defining the purpose of the whole analysis or stating the central idea to be examined. Your thesis will be the guiding principle of the essay and it should be obvious to the reader from the time of the first sentence.

5. Gather Evidence

Having the thesis sub-part done, you will now need to present the text evidence from which you will be able to support your argument. Seek out quotations, sections, or instances that validate the stated argument. These instances can be a symbol, an image, a speech by a character, or plot developments. Evidence the things that support your argument and are factual for your analysis in order to reduce the impact of the interfering factors.

6. Analyze the Text

Hence, now you will have to make use of your evidence to do the analysis. Now, separate the text into smaller parts and analyze how literary devices used in the text make it more meaningful. Take into account why the craftsman takes certain decisions and what effect these decisions have on the audience. Examine how devices like symbolism, imagery, irony, and foreshadowing strengthen the message and main ideas of the text.

7. Outline Your Essay

To start your work, you might want to outline your thinking and evidence to be able to organize them. Structure your literary analysis essay by dividing it into sections: Introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. Every paragraph will be devoted to a single sub-topic of your analysis and should begin with a clear sentence that indicates its purpose followed by appropriate evidence to back it up.

8. Write the Introduction

The opening part of the literary analysis essay is a place where you demonstrate your approach to your writing and where the reader should feel interested from the beginning. The best way to start is with a hook—an interesting one liner, a question, or an incident—that will make the reader want to read on and at the same time establish the importance of your analysis. Starting off, give the readers some information about the text, its author and the point your essay will drive home, which should be a clear statement of your thesis.

9. Develop Body Paragraphs

Body paragraphs is a place where you analyze in depth your viewpoint using supporting evidence. Ensure that each of your paragraphs starts with a topic sentence which identifies the main point or argument that you are going to explain in that paragraph. Next, you are required to provide support from a text that is giving a basis to a claim, being sure that you have analyzed each sentence and explained its meaning in relation to the thesis. Include examples, quotes, and citations to bolster your argument and have the reader accept the deconstruction you made.

10. Transition Smoothly

As you shift to the next paragraph in your literary analysis essay, be sure that the logical flow is not disrupted. Make use of transition words and phrases like “nevertheless”, “additionally”, “furthermore” and “beyond this” to link up your ideas together in a coherent manner. This assists the reader to follow your thought and make the logical flow of your thinking more obvious.

11. Write the Conclusion

A conclusion is like a period to an essay where you re-echo your points and state your thesis using different words. Try not to make a conclusion that is different from the one you have made or that is not related to the topic of analysis—the conclusion you make should be aimed at leaving the reader with a lasting impression. Finish by making a thought-provoking remark or an invitation to action that would leave a mark on your readers’ minds when they are thinking about the text.

12. Revise and Edit

The first draft is over, so sit down and respire for a while to reevaluate what you’ve written. Be careful about grammar, punctuation, and sentence architecture and check if your piece is not confusing and full of grammatical errors. First, see whether possible weakening or clarification of your analysis would be needed and edit the text accordingly.

13. Seek Feedback

So, don’t be afraid to ask your peers, mates or instructor for assessment when needed. Seeing the world through a different lens brings a lot of fresh perspectives that you haven’t thought of yet. Balance their feedback in your essay to adjust and revise the text with care in order to make it smarter.

So, don’t forget that in the beginning it may seem a bit difficult but with time and practice you will be a real pro in writing a literary analysis essay . The more you read literature and refine your analytical skills, you will recognize that the dissecting and interpreting of the text will get easier. Thus, my message to you is: do not be afraid to fully engage yourself in literary criticism and discover what lies at the core of your favorite novels. Happy writing!

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Making Literary Analysis Engaging With Student-Created Companion Books

Literary analysis is rarely students’ favorite task, but having them write for their peers can make it more engaging.

The literary analysis essay is rarely a favorite among English language arts (ELA) teachers and their students. Creativity, student choice, relevance, and authentic audience seem more difficult to incorporate into this traditional, though ubiquitous, genre. 

This challenge is partly because students’ analytical essays rarely have an audience or purpose beyond the English classroom. I’ve tackled this challenge by incorporating technology and student collaboration, inviting students to create guidebooks or companion books for literature.

Many teachers have developed and adapted the companion book strategy to suit their goals and needs, but the following approach is what I’ve found most successful. The activity has made literary analysis a favorite among my students.

Companion Book Basics

Companion books accompany and elaborate on already-published texts (books, series, movies, video games, or TV shows). They target an audience who has already read—and enjoyed—the text but want to know more about it or wish it never ended. 

Companion books aim to provide readers a deeper understanding of concepts in the original work. They give information and teach readers about ideas, concepts, or references they may have missed. Fans of many famous series ( Star Wars , Harry Potter , Marvel comics, etc.) have long made companion books, like the subgenre of “ fanfic ” that supplements these popular texts.

How to make it work

While students will likely balk at the task of writing an essay on the theme of The Outsiders , an assignment to collaborate with classmates and contribute a few chapters for a companion book to The Outsiders can almost sound fun, especially if students get to choose the focus of their own chapters (e.g., “Symbolism and Staying Gold” and “Foreshadowing Death”). I have my students draft a few potential tables of contents for their collaborative companion books and then divvy up the chapters based on who wants to write what. This way, I can still give them individual grades based only on their contributed chapters. 

It’s all the more enjoyable and meaningful if they are able to publish their work. I find Canva for Education is ideal, but I’ve also used Book Creator and other means of publication both digitally and in print. Our librarian supports our book-signing events in the school library, complete with barcoding and shelving students’ companion books—making them real, published authors who are searchable in our library database. I get to enjoy watching current students find and read the companion books of previous students on the library shelves.

Where to start

My favorite way to make this project a success is to have my students do this writing without even knowing it; by the time I present them with the task to write an entire companion book, the bulk of their writing is already done. 

I have them capture some written thoughts as they read a text (be it a whole-class novel, literature circle book, or independent choice book), but I never collect or grade this writing. I call it their “Deep Thoughts Notebook,” and I typically use Notice & Note signposts or other prompts that can work with any text to elicit deep thinking about reading—not just surface-level summaries. 

It’s downright fun when I task students with writing an entire book (cue tween outrage) and then tell them the good news that they’ve pretty much already written it. Each entry in their notebooks could easily become an interesting chapter in a companion book, and they’ve already quoted, cited, and elaborated on their unique thoughts about the text.

Infinite possibilities

Companion books are versatile and easily adaptable. The simplest way to incorporate collaborative companion books into the ELA classroom is with a whole-class novel. (My students have written companion books titled Inside The Outsiders , To Kill a Mockingbird: A Companion , and Everyone’s Monster: A Guide to A Monster Calls ).  

However, I do very few whole-class novel studies and have still used companion books to suit many ELA endeavors in lieu of the formal, traditional literary analysis essay. Companion books work with literature circles, short stories, author studies, and more. This year, I even had two seventh-grade ultra-fans of the Wings of Fire books write their own companion guide to this series, which they read independently throughout the year; they’d never been more motivated or productive readers and writers. 

What’s more, companion books don’t need to be collaborative. Individual students can work throughout the year on their book as a long-term project. 

Final tip for success

Be sure to clarify that the purpose of a companion book is not to simply summarize the original text. The content of companion books should look much more like a formal literary analysis than a book report. To engender the depth and quality of writing comparable to that of a literary analysis essay, provide examples of companion books, and have students determine how they are similar to and different from other forms of writing. 

Students should be able to readily observe that companion books do very little summarizing and instead function much like analysis—they cite and elaborate on direct quotes from the text that are highly relevant to the particular focus of the chapter, and they are bookended by a formal introduction and conclusion, to name just several features. 

I like to help students embrace the specific purpose and audience of companion books by explaining what I call the “ Easter egg effect.” I tell them: “Your readers don’t need you to tell them the basics of the text—they already know the main characters and setting and plot. But what did you notice, and think they probably missed? A true analysis reveals something through detailed examination. What’s your hot take? What Easter eggs will your writing reveal?” 

This framing focuses both their reading of the text and their writing about it.

10 Literary Analysis Essay Examples

To write a literary analysis essay always understand the assignment thoroughly and identify the key elements e.g. plot, characters, and themes. Select a central theme to focus on and put together evidence to support your analysis.

Fredrick Eghosa

May 20, 2024

Table of Contents

Key Takeaways

How to structure a literary analysis essay, the introduction, start with an attention-grabbing hook:, provide context and background information., explain the significance of the work:, include your thesis statement., preview your main points:, body paragraphs, always start with a topic sentence:, provide textual evidence., identify and analyze the literary devices:, link back to the thesis statement:, use transitions:, restate your thesis statement:, summarize key points:, emphasize the importance of your analysis:, avoid introducing new information:, example conclusion:, how to write a literary analysis essay with a co-writer, analyze the assignment thoroughly., engage in active reading:, identify key elements, analyze narrative techniques, choose a theme to focus on using cowriter, identify potential themes in the literary work:, evaluate the significance and depth of the themes in the work:, tap into personal interest and interpretation:, examples of themes:, collect and interpret the evidence., write a thesis statement, develop your argument, refer back to your thesis statement, organize your essay structure, support your argument with evidence, use cowriter to write a rough draft., refine and review your essay, types of literary analysis essay, close reading analysis, character analysis, thematic analysis, comparative analysis, symbolism and allegory analysis, historical or cultural analysis, narrative or structural analysis, literary analysis essay examples pdf free download, wrapping up.

• A literary analysis essay extensively evaluates specific aspects of a literary work or the work as a whole and thoroughly examines elements such as character development, plot intricacies, and setting.
• A literary analysis essay follows the structure of a typical academic essay, including an introduction, body, and conclusion.
• To write a literary analysis essay, begin by thoroughly understanding your assignment and analyzing the chosen literary work. Identify critical elements in the literary work, such as plot, characters, and themes. Choose a central theme to focus on and gather evidence to support your analysis. Craft a strong thesis statement and develop a coherent argument. Proceed to write your essay and edit it to ensure it's error-free.
• You can use CoWriter to streamline and improve the writing process.
• There are different types of literary analysis essays, such as:
• Author's name
• Title of the work
• Any relevant context (historical, cultural, or biographical).
• For every theme you state and intend to explore, you must present specific quotes, passages, or scenes from the literary work(s) to support your argument.
• Explain how the textual evidence supports your argument and contributes to the thematic analysis.
• Reflect on your reading and note any recurring ideas, emotions, or messages the text conveys.
• Consider broader concepts explored in the work, such as love, power, identity, justice, freedom, or morality.
• Analyze characters' motivations and conflicts to uncover underlying thematic concerns.
• Choose a theme central to the narrative that plays a substantial role in shaping the characters or plot.
• Select a theme that allows for in-depth analysis and invites multiple interpretations. Avoid overly simplistic or superficial themes.
• Choose a theme that resonates with you or sparks curiosity. When you are genuinely interested in the theme, you can conduct thorough research and develop a compelling essay.

• Start by choosing specific quotes that are relevant to your analysis. Look for passages that contain vivid language, symbolism, or thematic significance.
• Pay attention to descriptive details, imagery, and figurative language used by the author to convey thematic messages.
• Proceed by providing the context for each quote to explain its significance within the narrative. Consider the surrounding events or character actions that give meaning to the quoted passage.
• Analyze and note how literary devices (e.g., metaphor, symbolism, foreshadowing) contribute to the thematic development in the quoted passages.
• Clearly state the connection between the selected evidence and your broader argument about the text.
• Acknowledge contradictory viewpoints and explain why your interpretation is more compelling or supported by the text.
• Group related pieces of evidence together based on thematic connections or arguments in your essay outline.

• Create a clear outline that outlines the main points and supporting evidence you will present in your essay. Organize your ideas logically to build a coherent argument.
• Create an outline and decide where each piece of evidence fits within your overarching argument. At this stage, you may need more supporting points.
• Use specific quotes, passages, or examples from the literary work(s) to support your interpretations and claims.
• After presenting evidence, analyze how it relates to your argument and thesis statement. Explain the significance of the evidence in the context of the broader themes or ideas you are discussing.

• Review the organization of your essay. Ensure each paragraph flows logically from one to the next, supporting your thesis statement.
• Confirm that each body paragraph begins with a clear topic sentence that relates directly to your thesis and sets the focus for the paragraph.
• Revisit your thesis statement. Ensure it presents your main argument and provides a roadmap for the reader to understand the scope of your analysis.
• Evaluate the textual evidence you've provided. Ensure each quote or example directly supports your points about the theme or argument.
• Throughout the essay, maintain a consistent focus on the chosen theme. Avoid tangential discussions that do not directly contribute to your central argument.
• Edit for grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure errors. Pay attention to spelling and word choice.
• Focuses on analyzing a specific passage, scene, or excerpt from a literary work in detail.
• Examines language, style, imagery, and literary devices to uncover deeper meanings and themes.
• Example: Analyzing the symbolism of the green light in F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" and its thematic significance.
• Analyze a specific character's development, motivations, and significance in a literary work.
• Explores how characters contribute to the overall themes and messages of the text.
• Example: Examining the character of Hamlet in William Shakespeare's "Hamlet" to understand his internal conflicts and role in the play's exploration of revenge and mortality.
• Focuses on exploring and interpreting a literary work's central themes or ideas.
• Examines how recurring themes contribute to the overall meaning and impact of the text.
• Example**: Analyzing the theme of isolation in Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" and its implications for the characters' development and societal critique.
• Compares and contrasts two or more literary works, characters, themes, or authors.
• Highlights similarities and differences to deepen understanding of literary techniques, themes, or cultural contexts.
• Example: Comparing the depiction of women in Charlotte Bront's "Jane Eyre" and Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" to explore differing perspectives on gender roles.
• Analyzes symbolic elements and figurative representations within a literary work.
• reveals hidden meanings and underlying messages conveyed through symbols, motifs, or symbolic narratives.
• Examines a literary work's historical, cultural, or social context.
• Investigate how historical or cultural factors influence the author's themes, characters, and narrative techniques.
• Focuses on analyzing a literary work's narrative techniques, structure, and form.
• Examines how narrative choices impact the reader's experience and contribute to thematic development.

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• Data Analytics

Caltech Bootcamp / Blog / /

What is Text Analysis?

• Written by John Terra
• Updated on April 11, 2024

Do you know precisely what unstructured data is? If not, don’t worry; keeping track of all the terms and buzzwords associated with digital information is challenging. Unstructured data in online images, audio, video, or social media posts and conversations surround us daily. And let’s add e-mails, business documents, and webpages to that pile. So, how should a data analyst extract meaningful insights from that mess? Why, with text analysis, of course!

This article answers the question, “What is text analysis?” We’ll define the term, show how it works, why it’s important, and examine its techniques and applications. We’ll also share a data analytics program to help professionals upskill.

Let’s get down to business by defining the term. What is text analysis?

Text analysis (also called text mining and content analysis) is a machine learning technique used by computers to efficiently and intelligently extract valuable information from unstructured data. Developers and researchers use text analysis to convert diverse and unorganized data into a structured form. During this process, documents are disintegrated for trouble-free data piece management. To put it in simpler terms, text analysis converts unstructured text into structured data.

Now that we’ve clarified text analysis, what about text analytics? Are they the same? If not, then what is text analytics, then? It’s time for a comparison.

Also Read: Tutorial: Data Analysis in Excel

Text Mining vs. Text Analysis vs. Text Analytics: A Comparison

We have already established that text mining is just another term for text analysis. People often use the terms interchangeably to describe the same process of gathering data via statistical pattern learning.

So, what’s the difference between text analytics and text analysis?

The short version: text analysis provides qualitative results, while text analytics delivers quantitative results. If a computer performs text analysis, it’s identifying valuable information from the text itself. Still, if it’s performing text analytics, the machine discovers patterns across vast amounts of text, producing graphs, reports, and tables.

For instance, an IT help desk manager wants to know how many support tickets each team member has resolved. In this case, the manager uses text analytics to create a graph displaying individual ticket resolution rates.

However, if the IT manager also wants to know the proportion of tickets with positive or negative outcomes, they need text analytics. The process analyzes the text within each ticket and subsequent exchanges so the IT helpdesk manager can see how each agent handled their tickets and if customers were satisfied with the outcome.

So, text analysis’s main challenge is decoding the ambiguity of human speech, while text analytics’ big challenge is detecting trends and patterns from numerical results.

How Does Text Analysis Work?

How do we get text analysis to work? As with many artificial intelligence, machine learning, and natural language processing functions, the answer is algorithms. So, suppose a data analyst wants text analysis software to perform a particular task. In that case, they need to teach machine learning algorithms how to analyze, understand, and pull meanings from the text. But how? They accomplish this by tagging text examples. Once the machine has enough tagged text examples, algorithms can start differentiating and making associations between bits of text and create predictions.

The Importance of Text Analysis

Organizations use text analysis to prepare for employing a data-driven approach to content management. Once textual sources are broken down into easy-to-automate data pieces, new opportunity processes, such as marketing optimization, decision-making, business intelligence, product development, and more, are opened.

Capturing data through text analysis supports tasks like:

• Content management
• Semantic searches
• Content recommendations
• Regulatory compliance

Textual sources are turned into actionable data that can also be used to extract valuable information, use and reuse content, discover patterns, automatically manage, search beyond keywords, and much more.

Using text analysis is one of the initial steps for many data-driven approaches since the process pulls machine-readable facts from large bodies of texts and lets these facts be automatically entered into a database or a spreadsheet, which are then used to analyze data for trends, provide a natural language summary, or used for indexing purposes in information retrieval applications.

Also Read: Overview: What is Exploratory Data Analysis?

Common Text Analysis Techniques

Let’s study some of the more common text analysis techniques.

Text Classification

Text classification assigns predefined categories or tags to unstructured text. This technique is one of the most beneficial natural language processing (NLP) techniques because of its versatility. It can organize, structure, and categorize any text to provide meaningful data and solve problems. Text classification tasks include:

• Sentiment analysis, where customers leave their opinions on goods and services via interactions such as surveys.
• Topic analysis, which automatically organizes text by theme or subject.
• Intent detection, where machine learning is used to detect the intent of the text.

Text Extraction

Text extraction pulls pre-existing pieces of data within any text, extracting keywords, company names, prices, and product specifications from product reviews, news reports, and other sources. This technique is broken down further into:

• Keyword extraction is used to index the data to be searched and generate word clouds.
• Entity recognition finds entities (e.g., companies, people, or locations) within the text data.

Word Frequency

Using a numerical statistic, word frequency measures the most frequently occurring concepts or words in a particular text.

Collocation

Collocation finds words that commonly occur together, such as “customer service” or “maintenance plan.”

Concordance

Concordance identifies the context and instances of words or groups of words. For example, a concordance of the word “purchase” can help marketers understand how customers/users are using the word.

Word Sense Disambiguation

Many words have more than one meaning. For instance, “iron” is an appliance, a metal, or a verb. Smart text analysis trained in word sense disambiguation can differentiate between the meanings.

Text clusters can understand and group large amounts of unstructured data. Although clustering is less accurate than normal classification algorithms, it is faster to implement since the analyst doesn’t need to tag examples to train models. So, smart algorithms mine information and make predictions without using training data, a process called unsupervised machine learning.

How to Analyze Text Data

Here’s a series of easy steps to take when analyzing text data.

• Gather your data. Pull your data from internal sources (chats, e-mails, employee surveys, invoices) and external sources (online reviews, social media posts, news articles).
• Tokenization. Tokenization segregates raw text into many parts that make semantic sense. For example, the phrase text analytics improves digital marketing tokenizes the words text, analytics, digital, improves, and marketing.
• Part-of-speech tagging. Part-of-speech tagging attaches grammatical tags to tokenized text. For example, applying this step to the previously mentioned tokens results in text: Noun; analytics: Noun; improves: Verb; marketing: Noun.
• Parsing. Parsing uses English grammar to establish meaningful connections between tokenized words with English grammar.
• Lemmatization. Lemmatization simplifies words into their dictionary form, known as lemma. For example, the dictionary form of monetizing is monetize.
• Stop words removal. Stop words provide little or no semantic context to a sentence. These are words like as and, or, and for . The software often removes them from the structured text.
• Text classification. Classification assigns tags to the text data based on rules or machine learning-based systems.
• Text extraction . Extraction identifies specific keywords in the text and associates them with tags. Text analysis software uses conditional random fields (CRFs) and regular expressions.
• Visualization. Visualization turns text analysis results into easily understandable formats, such as graphs, charts, and tables. These visualized results help marketers to identify trends and patterns and create action plans. Many text analysts use tools such as Tableau, Google Data Studio, or Looker.

Also Read: Data Analyst Job Description: What Aspiring Professionals Need to Know

Five Text Analysis Examples and Applications

Here are five examples of how text analysis is applied to today’s IT-driven world.

• Preventing cybercrime . The Internet is a highly vulnerable medium for communication and data sharing. Text analysis is most likely one of the very few techniques successfully used to fight cybercrimes.
• Efficient customer service. Excellent customer service is one of the fundamental examples of how text analysis caters to improving customer service through mediums such as survey software or customer satisfaction follow-up, resulting in better products or services. This technique builds customer trust by offering fast, automated responses to customers when they need help.
• Advertising through digital media . Thanks to today’s increasingly digital world, advertising firms rely more on digital mediums to collect reliable results. Text analysis is one of the main tools advertising firms use to gather precise 360-degree results.
• Content enhancement. Humans generate content, but content enhancement eases the process by managing the sizeable bulk of data. Through text analysis, content can be enhanced by adding multiple aspects like organizing or providing the content with an outline so it can be applied to multiple implementations.
• Social media network data analysis. Social media is the most effective medium for connecting with your target audience and getting feedback, reviews, and criticism. This interaction can be used to improve goods and services and gives the company access to a helpful pool of data. Companies use social media strategies to gather insights into their products’ performances and understand the typical buyer’s persona. These insights help the company make the right improvements. Text analysis simplifies implementing vast amounts of data, extracting results from the analysis, and understanding user feedback and moods.

Do You Want to Develop Data Analytics Skills?

If you want to develop data analytics skills, why not start with this 24-week data analytics bootcamp ? This course will teach you how to use various tools and technologies to convert raw data into actionable insights. You will learn about generative AI and prompt engineering and gain skills in ChatGPT, DALL-E, Midjourney, and other popular tools.

Data analysts can earn an average of over $77K per year, according to Indeed.com . So, if you’re looking into a career change, consider data analysis and this highly instructive online bootcamp.

Q: What is meant by text analysis? A: Text analysis is a machine learning technique computers use to extract valuable information from unstructured data efficiently and intelligently.

Q: What is an example of text analysis? A: A company can use brand monitoring to monitor real-time comments and track positive and negative feedback on its products. By using text analysis to analyze customer reviews, especially for certain words or phrases, the company can better understand customer sentiment and improve its offerings.

Q: What are the functions of text analysis? A: Text analysis functions are typically broken down into topical text classification, word frequency analysis, emotion or sentiment analysis, visualizations, and data management.

Q: Why is text analysis useful? A: Text analysis lets businesses quickly and efficiently structure large quantities of information, such as e-mails, social media, chats, support tickets, and documents. This process provides real-time feedback, allowing the business to make faster product changes and allows organizations to redirect internal resources to more urgent tasks.

You might also like to read:

Data Analytics Certifications: Top Options in 2024

Best Data Analytics Tools in 2024 and Beyond

All About the Data Analyst Skills Professionals Need

How To Become a Data Analytics Manager

Exploring Online Data Analytics Courses and Bootcamps

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• Published: 11 May 2024

Insight into the research history and trends of total anomalous pulmonary venous connection: a bibliometric analysis

• Chen Wen 1 ,
• Geng Shen 2 ,
• Chenhao Fang 3 &
• Lan Tian 4  

Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery volume  19 , Article number:  285 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

194 Accesses

Metrics details

Total anomalous pulmonary venous connection (TAPVC) is a rare congenital heart disease characterized by the inability of all pulmonary veins to connect to the left atrium. Our previous bibliometric article summarized the characteristics of only the 100 most cited papers in TAPVC research. The purpose of this study was to use comprehensive bibliometric analysis to examine the development history, current status, and future trends in the field of TAPVC.

All publications on TAPVC published between 2000 and 2023 were collected from the Web of Science Core Collection. The publication and citation data were quantitatively analyzed by publication year, country, institution, author, and journal. Co-authorship and co-occurrence analyses were performed using VOSviewer, and keyword and reference bursts were identified using CiteSpace. Pearson’s test was used to examine the correlations between two continuous variables.

As of July 20, 2023, we identified 368 publications with 3320 citations. These publications were published in 132 journals and authored by 1835 researchers from 457 institutions in 47 countries. For the number of publications, the top country, top institution, top author, and top journals were the United States ( n  = 82), Shanghai Jiao Tong University ( n  = 13), Huiwen Chen ( n  = 9), and Annals of Thoracic Surgery and Pediatric Cardiology ( n  = 29 each), respectively. For the number of citations, the top country, top affiliation, top author, and top journal were the United States ( n  = 1348), University of Toronto ( n  = 250), Christopher A. Caldarone ( n  = 315), and Annals of Thoracic Surgery ( n  = 746), respectively. The number of national publications significantly correlated with GDP ( R  = 0.887, P  < 0.001), research & development (R&D) expenditure ( R  = 0.375, P  = 0.013), population ( R  = 0.694, P  < 0.001), and journals ( R  = 0.751, P  < 0.001). The number of national citations significantly correlated with GDP ( R  = 0.881, P  < 0.001), R&D expenditure ( R  = 0.446, P  = 0.003), population ( R  = 0.305, P  = 0.037), and journals ( R  = 0.917, P  < 0.001). International collaboration in the field of TAPVC was not well developed. The most commonly cited publication discussed era changes in mortality and reoperation rate in TAPVC patients. The most common keywords were “total anomalous pulmonary venous connection” and “congenital heart disease”. The keyword “case report” appeared most recently, with an average occurrence year of 2021.8. The co-occurrence analysis grouped 26 keywords into six themes: surgical repair of TAPVC, postoperative pulmonary vein stenosis, surgical repair of TAPVC patients with heterotaxy, application of echocardiography in diagnosing TAPVC, application of echocardiography in the prenatal diagnosis of TAPVC, and application of the sutureless technique in the surgical repair of TAPVC patients with right atrial isomerism or a single ventricle. Citation burst detection identified 32 references with citation bursts, seven of which had ongoing citation bursts until 2023.

Conclusions

This study conducted a bibliometric analysis to provide a comprehensive overview of TAPVC research. We hope to offer new ideas for promoting development in the field of TAPVC.

Peer Review reports

Total anomalous pulmonary venous connection (TAPVC) is a rare congenital anomaly that accounts for approximately 1–3% of congenital heart disease and is characterized by the inability of all pulmonary veins to connect to the left atrium [ 1 ]. The clinical presentation depends on the severity of pulmonary venous obstruction and the size of the right-to-left shunt. Patients usually present with symptoms in early childhood and are diagnosed within one year. When preoperative pulmonary venous obstruction is absent, pulmonary blood flow returns freely to the right atrium through the anomalous pulmonary connection. Subsequently, it crosses the foramen ovale, and the patient is usually born with mild symptoms. The pulmonary vascular resistance decreases after birth, excessive pulmonary circulation occurs, and elevated volume and pressure loads are transmitted to the right heart. Patients exhibit shortness of breath, tachycardia, and feeding difficulties and suffer from severe stunted growth, with most dying within the first year of life. If preoperative pulmonary venous obstruction is present, pulmonary venous hypertension and edema progress with increased pulmonary blood flow after birth. Hypoxemia and acidosis progress as a result of reflexive pulmonary artery vasoconstriction and poor gas exchange caused by pulmonary edema, and patients even develop symptoms similar to those of respiratory distress syndrome [ 2 ]. If left untreated, the mortality rate can reach 80% in the first year of life [ 3 ]. Surgery is the only effective treatment for TAPVC, and the underlying physiology of TAPVC determines the timing of surgery and the necessity of temporary measures. Elective surgical repair of TAPVC without preoperative pulmonary venous obstruction can be performed in neonates or postponed until 3–6 months of age. TAPVC with preoperative pulmonary venous obstruction is usually repaired by emergency surgery, which can be temporarily relieved through catheterization [ 4 ]. Although progress in diagnostic techniques, surgical interventions, and perioperative management has significantly improved the perioperative survival rate, postoperative pulmonary vein stenosis (PVS) remains a great challenge and leads to a disappointing prognosis [ 5 ]. Consequently, research on TAPVC is highly important. In recent years, TAPVC has received much attention, and there is an increasing body of publications on this topic. It is essential to understand the development history, current status, and future trends in the field of TAPVC.

In recent years, bibliometric analysis has become a common tool for analyzing the characteristics of a publication, such as publication year, countries, institutions, authors, journals, citations, and keywords. This analysis method allows researchers to determine the knowledge structure, development history, and future trends in a particular field [ 6 ]. With the increase in the number of scientific publications and the importance of research influence, bibliometric analysis plays an important role in evaluating research. Although bibliometric analysis has been widely used in the medical field, to our knowledge, only one bibliometric article on TAPVC research that we published earlier is available [ 7 ]. Our previous article only summarized the characteristics of the 100 most cited papers in the field of TAPVC. At present, there is no systematic or comprehensive bibliometric study on TAPVC. This new analysis explored the following specific aspects of TAPVC research. First, the number of publications and citations was examined by year, country, institution, author, journal, and keyword. Second, the correlations between a country’s number of publications and citations and its gross domestic product (GDP), percentage of GDP spent on research, population size, and number of journals were examined. Finally, keyword co-occurrence analysis was performed to understand the research themes. In general, a comprehensive analysis of the development history, research hotspots, and future trends in the field of TAPVC was performed using bibliometric tools. This study is expected to provide a reference and new ideas for promoting the development of TAPVC.

Data source

Compared with other databases such as Scopus, PubMed, and Medline, the Web of Science is more accurate and comprehensive and can serve as an important data source for medical researchers to perform bibliometric analysis [ 8 ]. All the relevant publications on TAPVC were retrieved using the advanced searching functionality of the Web of Science core collection (WoSCC) on July 20, 2023. The author developed the following search strategy after consulting with publication search specialists. The words “total anomalous pulmonary venous connection,” “total anomalous pulmonary venous drainage,” “total anomalous pulmonary venous return,” “TAPVC,” “TAPVD,” or “TAPVR” were used as search terms in the title. The publication year was limited to 2000–2023. Only publications written in English were included to promote analysis of the content. Because publication types such as meeting abstracts and editorials do not have the same frequency of citations and peer-review process, only publication types of articles or reviews were included in the analysis. After filtering, a full record with citations was downloaded from the database in plain text format. The impact factor (IF) of journals was obtained by manual retrieval through the Journal Citation Report (JCR) 2022 (Clarivate Analytics) [ 9 ]. The latest gross national product (GDP), research & development (R&D) expenditure, and population data for different countries are obtained from the World Bank.

Bibliometric analysis

VOSviewer [ 10 ] and Citespace [ 11 ] are the main bibliometric analysis software. The number of accumulated publications was fitted with the publication year using SPSS software. The numbers of publications, citations, and keywords were analyzed using VOSviewer. Countries, institutions, authors, and journals were ranked by the number of publications or citations. A co-authorship relationship occurs when two authors participate in the same publication. Co-authorship analysis was used to reveal country, institution, and author collaborations. Collaborations between countries were visualized using an online bibliometric website ( https://bibliometric.com ). The frequency of collaboration between countries was calculated using the bibliometrix package in R [ 12 ]. The keywords represent the theme of the publication. Keyword co-occurrence refers to the existence of two different keywords in the same publication, and the keyword co-occurrence network can reveal research hotspots [ 13 ]. The emergence of keywords in different periods reflects the changing trend of research hotspots. A citation burst refers to a significant increase in the number of citations a publication receives, which lasts at least two years [ 11 ]. References and keywords that were associated with citation bursts were identified using CiteSpace. Pearson’s test was used to examine the correlations between the number of publications or citations and the GDP, R&D expenditure, population, and journals of different countries. The correlations between the number of publications or citations and the IFs of different journals were also investigated. A two-sided P value < 0.05 was considered to indicate statistical significance.

Annual publication growth

A total of 558 publications were retrieved, including 356 articles, 12 reviews, and 190 publications of other types. Articles and reviews ( n  = 368) were included in further analysis. The growth of publications with respect to publication year is shown in Fig.  1 A. The number of publications on TAPVC showed an overall increasing trend, suggesting increasing interest in the research field of TAPVC. Before 2016, the number of publications fluctuated with the publication year. In subsequent years, the number of publications grew rapidly (the significant reduction in 2023 is attributed to incomplete data). An S curve function was utilized to explore the relationship between the cumulative number of publications and the publication year, which fit the trend well (R 2  = 0.940) (Fig.  1 B). This strong correlation suggests that the field of TAPVC is still in a period of rapid growth and development.

Number of publications per year (A) and the cumulative number of publications (B)

National production of publications

To study each country’s contribution to the TAPVC field, the number of publications for each country was examined. A total of 47 countries/regions worldwide have conducted research on TAPVC (Fig.  2 A). The top 20 countries/regions with the most publications are displayed in Supplementary Fig. 1, Additional File 1 . There was no doubt that the United States was the main impetus in the field of TAPVC, with 82 publications, followed by China ( n  = 72), Japan ( n  = 50), and India ( n  = 48). Each of the remaining countries/regions has fewer 30 publications. Pearson’s analysis revealed that there was a significant correlation between the number of publications and the GDP ( R  = 0.887, P  < 0.001) (Fig.  2 B), R&D expenditure ( R  = 0.375, P  = 0.013) (Fig.  2 C) and population ( R  = 0.694, P  < 0.001) (Fig.  2 D) of different countries.

(A) Each country’s contribution to the field of total anomalous pulmonary venous connection; Pearson’s analysis revealed a significant correlation between the number of publications and gross domestic product (B) , research and development (R&D) expenditure (C) and population (D) of different countries. (E) Collaborations between countries; (F) Network clustering of country co-authorship analysis; (G) Time-overlapping network of country co-authorship analysis

The collaborations between countries are displayed in Fig.  2 E. The United States was the leader in international collaborations in the field of TAPVC. The most frequent collaborations were between the United States and the United Kingdom, the United States and China, the United States and Sweden, the United Kingdom and Sweden, the United Kingdom and India, and Egypt and Saudi Arabia, with a frequency of three each. To study the collaborations between countries, a co-authorship analysis of publications from these countries was performed (Fig.  2 F). The circle size represents the number of publications, and the color represents the cluster. These 47 countries formed eight clusters, with the red and green clusters being the largest, each comprising four countries. The color of the circle in the time-overlapping network indicates the average year of publication for each country (Fig.  2 G). Overall, there were very few connections between different clusters, indicating that international collaboration in the field of TAPVC needs to be better developed.

Institutional production of publications

To study each institution’s contribution to the TAPVC field, the number of publications for each institution was examined. A total of 457 institutions worldwide were involved in the research field of TAPVC. The top 20 institutions with the most publications are shown in Supplementary Fig. 2, Additional File 1 . Seven of the top 20 institutions were from China, followed by the United States and Australia, with 6 and 3 institutions, respectively. In terms of the specific institution, Shanghai Jiao Tong University topped the list with 13 publications, followed by All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Capital Medical University, and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia with 9, 8, and 8 publications, respectively.

To study the collaborations between institutions, a co-authorship analysis of publications from these institutions was performed (Fig.  3 A). The circle size represents the number of publications, and the color represents the cluster. These 457 institutions formed five clusters, with the red cluster being the largest, which comprised 11 institutions, mainly from the United States. The time-overlapping network showed the average year of publication for each institution (Fig.  3 B). Overall, there were very few connections between different clusters, indicating that institutional collaboration in the field of TAPVC was not well developed.

(A) Network clustering of institutional co-authorship analysis; (B) Time-overlapping network of institutional co-authorship analysis

Author production of publications

To study each author’s contribution to the TAPVC field, the number of publications for each institution was examined. A total of 1 835 authors have been committed to the field of TAPVC, and most (88.1%) have published only one publication. Each core author (2.8%) has published at least three publications, and these authors collaborated as research teams. The top 20 authors with the most publications are displayed in Supplementary Fig. 3, Additional File 1 . Huiwen Chen was the greatest contributor, with 9 publications, followed by Guocheng Shi, with 8 publications. Christopher A. Caldarone, Yves d’Udekem, Igor E. Konstantinov, and Zhongqun Zhu each had 7 publications.

To study the collaboration between authors, a co-authorship analysis was performed, and the results are displayed in Fig.  4 A. The circle size represents the number of publications, and the color represents the cluster. These authors formed 9 clusters, with the red cluster being the largest, comprising 17 authors, mainly from Shanghai Jiao Tong University. The time-overlapping network showed the average year of publication for each author (Fig.  4 B). Researchers from China have formed research networks in the field of TAPVC.

(A) Network clustering of the results of the researcher co-authorship analysis; (B) Time-overlapping network of the researcher co-authorship analysis

Disciplinary distribution of publications

To study the disciplinary distribution in the field of TAPVC, the number of publications for each WOS category was examined. The four disciplines with the most publications were cardiac & cardiovascular systems ( n  = 244), surgery ( n  = 120), pediatrics ( n  = 81), and respiratory system ( n  = 72). Other disciplines included radiology, nuclear medicine & medical imaging ( n  = 28), medicine, general & internal ( n  = 24), obstetrics & gynecology ( n  = 15), acoustics ( n  = 15), genetics & heredity ( n  = 11), and peripheral vascular disease ( n  = 9). This indicated that the research performed in this field was broad and diverse and could attract the attention of researchers from different fields.

Journal production of publications

These 368 publications were published in 132 journals. The top 20 journals with the most publications are displayed in Supplementary Table 1, Additional File 1 . Annals of Thoracic Surgery and Pediatric Cardiology topped the list with 29 publications each, followed by Journal of Cardiac Surgery with 24 publications. Each of the remaining journals had fewer than 20 publications. There were 48 journals from the United States, followed by the United Kingdom with 19 journals. China, Japan, and Switzerland each had eight journals. Pearson’s analysis revealed a significant correlation between the number of publications and the number of journals ( R  = 0.751, P  < 0.001) in different countries (Fig.  5 A). Bradford’s law showed that six core journals published 128 publications (Fig.  5 B). These findings can aid researchers in selecting the most appropriate journals to publish their manuscripts.

(A) Pearson’s analysis revealed a significant correlation between the number of publications and the number of journals in different countries; (B) Bradford’s law showed that six core journals published 128 publications

Most cited publications

Citation count is one of the indices used to judge the academic influence of a publication. Highly cited publications usually represent important research topics in a specific field. To study the influence of publications in the field of TAPVC, the number of citations each publication received was examined. The 20 most cited publications are displayed in Supplementary Table 2, Additional File 1 , and all of them have been cited more than 40 times. Notably, nineteen of the 20 most-cited publications were published in JCR Q1 journals, and the remaining one was in JCR Q2 journal, indicating that these publications were published in high-level journals. Of these 20 publications, 15 focused on surgical treatment, two examined the application of echocardiography in prenatal diagnosis, two investigated the pathogenic mechanism of TAPVC, and the remaining one examined late neurodevelopmental problems after surgical repair of TAPVC. A publication published in Circulation in 2007 has received the most citations: “Factors associated with mortality and reoperation in 377 children with total anomalous pulmonary venous connection” [ 14 ]. This study involved a large single-institution cohort of patients whose mortality after surgical repair of TAPVC decreased but remained high in young patients and those with cardiac TAPVC or preoperative PVS. Despite improvements in perioperative care, unfavorable anatomic characteristics remain important risk factors for postoperative mortality. The second most cited publication was also published in Circulation: “Total anomalous pulmonary venous connection: morphology and outcome from an international population-based study” [ 15 ]. This international population-based study investigated the morphological characteristics of TAPVC and explored risk factors for postoperative mortality and PVS. The third most cited publication was published in Annals of Thoracic Surgery in 2005: “Total anomalous pulmonary venous connection: An analysis of current management strategies in a single institution” [ 16 ]. This study explored the impact of management strategies on postoperative mortality and PVS and revealed that the prognosis of patients with a single ventricle was still worse than that of patients with two ventricles.

National citations

To study the influence of each country in the field of TAPVC, the number of citations each country received was examined (Fig.  6 A). The top 20 countries/regions with the most citations are displayed in Supplementary Fig. 4, Additional File 1 . The United States ranked first ( n  = 1348), followed by Canada ( n  = 402). China ( n  = 384), Japan ( n  = 364), and the United Kingdom ( n  = 341). Each of the remaining countries had fewer than 300 citations. Pearson’s analysis revealed that there was a significant correlation between the number of citations and the GDP ( R  = 0.881, P  < 0.001) (Fig.  6 B), R&D expenditure ( R  = 0.446, P  = 0.003) (Fig.  6 C), and population ( R  = 0.305, P  = 0.037) (Fig.  6 D) of different countries.

(A) The number of citations each country received in the field of total anomalous pulmonary venous connection; Pearson’s analysis revealed that there was a significant correlation between the number of citations and gross domestic product (B) , research and development (R&D) expenditure (C) , and population (D) of different countries

Institutional citations

To study the influence of each institution in the field of TAPVC, the number of citations each institution received was examined. The top 20 institutions with the most citations are shown in Supplementary Fig. 5, Additional File 1 . Six of the top 20 institutions were from the United States, followed by the United Kingdom, which has four institutions. In terms of the specific institution, the University of Toronto topped the list with 250 citations, followed by Queen Silvia Children’s Hospital, University of London Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia with 248, 248 and 233 citations, respectively. Each of the remaining institutions had fewer than 200 citations.

Author citations

To study the influence of each author in the field of TAPVC, the number of citations each author received was examined. The top 20 authors with the most citations are displayed in Supplementary Fig. 6, Additional File 1 . Christopher A. Caldarone topped the list with 315 citations, followed by John G. Coles and Glen S. Van Arsdell with 271 citations each. Each of the remaining authors had fewer than 200 citations.

Journal citations

To study the influence of each journal in the field of TAPVC, the number of citations each journal received was examined. The top 20 journals with the most publications are displayed in Supplementary Table 3, Additional File 1 . Annals of Thoracic Surgery topped the list with 746 citations, followed by Circulation and Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery with 402 and 401 citations, respectively. Each of the remaining journals had fewer than 300 citations. Pearson’s analysis revealed a significant correlation between the number of citations and the number of journals ( R  = 0.917, P  < 0.001) in different countries (Fig.  7 A). There was also a significant correlation between the number of citations and the IF of different journals ( R  = 0.398, P  < 0.001) (Fig.  7 B).

(A) Pearson’s analysis revealed a significant correlation between the number of citations and the number of journals of different countries; (B) There was a significant correlation between the number of citations and the impact factor of different journals

Citation bursts of references

Citation burst detection was performed to capture the rapid increase in the popularity of references over a specific period. A total of 32 references with citation bursts from 2000 to 2023 were identified (Fig.  8 ). The blue line represents the time interval from 2000 to 2023, and the red line represents the period of citation bursts. The publication “Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Connection: The Current Management Strategies in a Pediatric Cohort of 768 Patients”, published in Circulation, had the highest citation burst value of 8.04 [ 5 ]. This multicenter study employed a large cohort of patients (768 individuals) to investigate the influence of current therapeutic regimens on the results of TAPVC. This study revealed that surgical treatment in patients with TAPVC could yield an acceptable outcome and investigated risk factors associated with mortality and postoperative PVS. This study explored the effects of the sutureless technique and revealed that this technique decreased the incidence of postoperative PVS in patients with preoperative PVS but not in patients without preoperative PVS. The publication “Repair of Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Connection: Risk Factors for Postoperative Obstruction” published in Annals of Thoracic Surgery, had the second highest citation burst value of 7.99 [ 17 ]. Because the definition of preoperative PVS has widely varied in prior studies, this research graded the severity of preoperative PVS to precisely examine the risk factors for postoperative PVS. This study may help in the risk stratification of patients with TAPVC. The publication “Surgical results of total anomalous pulmonary venous connection repair in 256 patients”, published in Interactive Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery, had the third highest citation burst value of 6.96 [ 18 ]. This study revealed that the long-term outcomes of surgical repair for TAPVC patients were satisfactory, and predictors of mortality and postoperative PVS were investigated. Postoperative PVS was strongly related to mortality, and close follow-up was needed, particularly within six months after surgery. The most recent burst occurred in 2021 and has lasted for three years. Seven references with ongoing citation bursts until 2023 deserve our further attention. Of these publications, six focused on the surgical treatment of TAPVC, and the remaining study focused on the classification of pulmonary venous malformations. One meta-analysis published by Wu et al. is worth noting [ 19 ]. This meta-analysis included 26 studies involving a total of 2702 patients and compared outcomes between the sutureless technique and conventional repair and revealed that the sutureless technique could reduce the incidence of postoperative PVS and re-operations, but could not reduce postoperative early, late, or overall mortality. The popularity of these research topics is likely to continue, and they could thus become potential frontiers in the future.

Citation burst detection identified 32 references with citation bursts

Frequency of keywords

Keywords were the high condensation and summary of the main contents of a publication, which could indicate the research theme. Frequency analysis of keywords can help researchers quickly identify the main research hotspots in a research field. Supplementary Fig. 7, Additional File 1 shows the top 20 keywords with the greatest frequency. There was no doubt that “total anomalous pulmonary venous connection” topped the lists with a frequency of 181, followed by “congenital heart disease” ( n  = 60), “pulmonary vein stenosis” ( n  = 41), “echocardiography” ( n  = 20), “pulmonary vein” ( n  = 20), “sutureless technique” ( n  = 16), “prenatal diagnosis” ( n  = 13), “surgery” ( n  = 13), “fetal echocardiography” ( n  = 12), and “single ventricle” ( n  = 11).

Major research areas

Keyword co-occurrence analysis is an important approach for investigating the main research interests and hot issues in a specific research field. Among 546 keywords, 35 met the threshold of 5 occurrences. If keywords had the same meanings, they were merged. After merging duplicate keywords, 26 (threshold setting of 5) were displayed in the network visualization (Fig.  9 A). The node size represents the frequency of the keywords, and the distance between them represents the strength of the association. Closely related keywords were grouped into one cluster, and each cluster represented one research domain. The 26 keywords were grouped into six clusters. The red cluster was the largest and included the keywords “congenital,” “heart defects,” “infant,” “mortality,” “outcome,” “pulmonary vein,” and “surgery” This indicates that the most important topic was surgical repair of TAPVC. The green cluster included the keywords such as “total anomalous pulmonary venous connection,” “pulmonary vein stenosis,” “pulmonary hypertension,” and “stent” and was mainly associated with postoperative PVS, an important complication after surgical repair of TAPVC. The blue cluster included the keywords such as “anomalous pulmonary venous connection,” “congenital heart surgery,” and “heterotaxy” and was mainly related to the surgical repair of TAPVC patients with heterotaxy. The yellow cluster included the keywords such as “congenital heart disease” and “echocardiography” and was mainly related to the application of echocardiography in diagnosing TAPVC. The purple cluster included the keywords such as “fetal echocardiography” and “prenatal diagnosis” and was mainly related to the application of echocardiography in the prenatal diagnosis of TAPVC. Finally, the light blue cluster included the keywords “right atrial isomerism,” “single ventricle,” and “sutureless technique” and was mainly related to the application of the sutureless technique in the surgical repair of TAPVC patients with right atrial isomerism or a single ventricle.

(A) Network clustering of keyword co-occurrence analysis; (B) Time-overlapping co-occurrence network of keywords

Figure  9 B shows the visualization of the time overlapping of keywords. Different nodes are marked with different colors based on the average occurrence year of these keywords. The keyword “case report” appeared most recently, with an average occurrence year of 2021.8.

Keyword bursts

Citation burst detection was conducted to explore the rapid increase in popularity of keywords over a specific period. In this study, there were no keywords with citation bursts. This suggests that research topics are relatively smooth in the field of TAPVC.

This bibliometric study quantitatively analyzed the characteristics of publications in the field of TAPVC and comprehensively reviewed its development history, current status, and future trends. The present study is important for several reasons. Scholars can be aware of research hotspots and set future study directions. This bibliometric study can serve as an educational tool for residents to familiarize themselves with TAPVC development. Journal editors can recognize potentially important manuscripts based on prior knowledge. Clinicians can apply the latest findings to clinical practice to achieve better results. The government may formulate future funding policies and research investment plans.

Research growth in the field of TAPVC has experienced two stages according to the increasing number of publications over time. Before 2016, there was a long, slow growth stage of knowledge accumulation, and it was essential to have practical clinical experience rather than technical improvement. In 2017, a publication published in Circulation used a large patient cohort to examine the current outcome of TAPVC patients [ 5 ]. Since 2017, TAPVC research has entered a rapid growth stage, indicating that it has entered a phase of rapid development. During the second stage, the importance of this medical condition is recognized, researchers have become interested in this topic, and research outputs in this field have substantially increased. Overall, the rapid growth trend in TAPVC research will likely continue. Despite the fast-growing trend of research outputs in the field of TAPVC, studies on TAPVC are generally still lagging behind those on other cardiovascular diseases, such as hypertension and arteriosclerosis. The rarity of this disease is to blame for the lower research activity in the field of TAPVC compared with more mature fields.

The United States is in a dominant position in terms of quantity and quality and is the core of international collaboration in the field of TAPVC. The United States is dominant in many other fields, indicating that the United States is at the cutting edge in the scientific community. The present study showed that greater number of journals, a greater GDP, a greater population, and greater R&D expenditure promote research productivity and impact in the field of TAPVC. GDP represents the total value of all productive activities over a time period and is the primary measure of a country’s strength. It is widely believed that the economic conditions of a country will affect its research output. The current study’s results align with previous research showing a link between GDP and scientific research output [ 20 ]. Policy-makers in less developed countries need to provide more support to maintain the growth trend of knowledge in the field of TAPVC. Only in this way could medical staff perform better clinical interventions and thus improve outcomes in clinical practice with the support of these strong-evidence studies [ 20 ]. The investment in R&D determines the level of infrastructure and resources for research, the contribution to scientific progress and innovation, and the creation of new knowledge [ 21 ]. Countries with limited research output should increase the proportion of R&D investment to improve scientific productivity and impact. Finding this correlation is particularly important in the current economic climate. The financial pressure on the government has contributed to a reduction in research funding. A direct correlation between research investment and scientific output could demonstrate the benefits of continued support for research funding. University and university hospitals are the birthplaces of medical knowledge. Countries with low research output should increase the number of universities and hospitals. Consistent with previous research, our study shows that countries with more indexed journals produce more scientific work [ 21 ]. Researchers tend to submit manuscripts to journals from their own countries and cite journals from their own countries. Countries with low research output should establish more internationally influential journals. The population is an important factor in TAPVC research. TAPVC is extremely rare; only an adequate population can accumulate enough cases. The extremely low incidence of TAPVC suggests that a sufficient number of patients can be included in studies based only on a sufficient population. A national medical center with centralized resources and knowledge should be established to collect cases scattered throughout the country. International collaboration and the sharing and exchange of patient data should be encouraged to increase the number of patients worldwide for research. In addition, registries and databases should be established to centralize dispersed patients [ 22 ]. When interpreting these results, however, some confounding factors need to be taken into account. Because domestic papers are published faster, it is possible that researchers from some countries tend to publish their findings in local journals. Such publications are not included in the present study. Only recently have some countries published papers in international journals. In addition, a previous study showed that proficiency in English facilitated the publication of articles in international journals [ 23 ]. Manuscripts from English-speaking countries have a greater chance of being accepted than those from non-native English-speaking countries.

Inadequate international research collaboration is a potential reason for the limited research outputs in the field of TAPVC. International collaboration is one of the future development directions. TAPVC is extremely rare, and a limited number of patients and researchers may hinder TAPVC research in many countries. International research collaboration will increase research productivity and impact in this field [ 24 ]. Collaborative works enhance the sharing of researchers and patients among countries to produce more research outcomes. The lack of international collaboration is difficult to explain but may be due to a lack of funding, communications, favorable circumstances, or international conferences in this field. Nonetheless, the included publications are limited to those published in English, which can distort the actual situation of international collaboration. To improve collaboration, we need to form societies on pediatric cardiac surgery, hold international and regional academic conferences, establish specialized journals on congenital heart surgery, create international databases on congenital heart surgery, provide global management for patients with congenital heart disease, strengthen education, research and community service, promote international exchange of trainees, provide educational programs for medical staff coming from different countries, facilitate international teaching and treatment, certify congenital heart surgeons globally to move surgeons to areas of need, promote international collaboration by contacting leading authors or research groups at the global level, encourage collaboration in intergovernmental organizations, give aid loans, donate equipment to hospitals, provide services and public infrastructures, offer training scholarships for foreign doctors, establish new pediatric cardiac surgery centres, and sponsor overseas medical missions [ 25 , 26 ].

The journal analysis showed that Annals of Thoracic Surgery had the largest number of publications and citations in this field of TAPVC. This journal has an IF of 4.6 (2022) and focuses on cardiothoracic surgery. Researchers tend to publish and cite publications in this journal because this journal is a highly ranked academic journal in the field of cardiothoracic surgery, and high-ranking academic journals are always looking for novel and valuable research. Bradford’s law showed that six core journals published 128 publications. The main idea of Bradford’s law is that core journals publish the most articles that are widely cited [ 27 ]. When researchers stray from core journals, the impact of published articles declines. This trend has resulted in the majority of highly cited papers coming from a small number of professional journals. There was a significant correlation between the number of citations and the IF of different journals. Our research obeys the well-known rule that most cited articles are published in journals with high IFs, which in turn leads to the high IFs of these journals.

Co-occurrence analysis of keywords identified six themes: surgical repair of TAPVC, postoperative PVS, surgical repair of TAPVC patients with heterotaxy, application of echocardiography in diagnosing TAPVC, application of echocardiography in the prenatal diagnosis of TAPVC, and application of sutureless technique in the surgical repair of TAPVC patients with right atrial isomerism or a single ventricle.

Without intervention, the mortality rate during the first year of life is as high as 80%. Surgery is the only effective treatment for this disease. Due to improved diagnostic accuracy, surgical approaches, and perioperative management, early mortality is steadily decreasing, but there is still considerable variability. The early mortality rate reported in recent publications ranges between < 10% and 20%. Surgical management of TAPVC remains a challenge [ 28 ].

PVS is the most common complication after surgical repair of TAPVC with an incidence of 10–20%, and remains an issue. PVS is associated with high morbidity and mortality following surgical repair. PVS usually occurs within a few months after surgical repair and progresses rapidly. The effective methods for preventing postoperative PVS are still unknown and are worth exploring [ 28 ].

Heterotaxy syndrome is frequently associated with TAPVC. The outcomes of patients with heterotaxy syndrome who undergo TAPVC repair remain unclear, and there are limited data. Some studies have reported that heterotaxy syndrome is a significant risk factor, while others have found no significant difference in the survival of heterotaxy patients [ 29 ].

The surgical results of TAPVC depend on a detailed understanding of the anatomical morphology. Echocardiography remains the first-line diagnostic modality for TAPVC because of its safety and accessibility. However, echocardiography has disadvantages, such as poor spatial resolution, an acoustic window, and poor interpretation accuracy. Echocardiography exhibits good performance in diagnosing isolated TAPVC but has limited accuracy in diagnosing mixed or infracardiac TAPVC and TAPVC associated with obstruction, heterotaxy syndrome, or right atrial isomerism. Improving the diagnostic accuracy of echocardiography in challenging cases remains to be addressed [ 30 ].

Prenatal diagnosis of TAPVC, especially obstructive TAPVC, is essential for birth planning and postpartum management and decreases morbidity and mortality in the perinatal period. Fetal heart echocardiography is the primary diagnostic modality. However, the prenatal diagnosis of TAPVC is very challenging, and misdiagnosis and missed diagnosis are extremely common [ 31 ].

Single ventricle and right atrial isomerism are frequently associated with TAPVC. In such patients, abnormal localization of thoracic structures, such as the great arteries and systemic veins, results in compression of pulmonary venous drainage. The outcomes of patients with a single ventricle or right atrial isomerism who undergo surgical repair of TAPVC remain poor and are associated with a high risk of postoperative PVS and mortality [ 32 , 33 ]. The effective treatment for these patients remains elusive. The sutureless technique has been introduced to reduce the risk of postoperative PVS. In this technique, the pulmonary venous confluence and the left atrium were opened, and the left atrium wall was sutured to the mediastinal pleura. The sutureless technique was favored because of its broad applicability to different anatomical morphologies and avoidance of direct anastomosis of the pulmonary vein endothelium. The efficacy, applicability, and indications of the sutureless technique are still not well established [ 34 ]. The favorable results of the sutureless technique in some recent studies have extended the indications of this technique to difficult patients, such as those with a single ventricle or right atrial isomerism [ 33 ]. However, the outcomes of the sutureless technique in such patients remain uncertain.

There are some limitations to this present bibliometric analysis. First, the search strategy was performed only in the WoSCC database. Because the WoSCC database includes most high -quality publications, it does not distort the overall trend of the research results. Second, this study included only publications written in English and omitted those written in native languages. Second, recently published high-quality studies may not have received sufficient attention due to citation delays and need to be updated in subsequent studies. Third, more citations do not always mean higher quality and controversial publications tend to have more citations. Fourth, only articles and reviews were included. However, these two types of publications are more likely to represent contributions to a research field. Finally, some limitations inherent in bibliometrics should be considered. For example, the importance of recently published publications is underestimated because there is not enough time to accumulate citations.

This bibliometric analysis identified the most influential publications and identified the most prominent countries, institutions, authors, and journals in the field of TAPVC. The field of TAPVC is still in a period of rapid growth and development. A greater number of journals, GDP, population, and research & development expenditure promote research productivity and impact. International collaboration in the field of TAPVC should be encouraged. The research themes in this field are focused on six areas: surgical repair of TAPVC, postoperative pulmonary vein stenosis, surgical repair of TAPVC patients with heterotaxy, application of echocardiography in diagnosing TAPVC, application of echocardiography in the prenatal diagnosis of TAPVC, and application of the sutureless technique in the surgical repair of TAPVC patients with right atrial isomerism or a single ventricle. This study is the first bibliometric analysis to provide a comprehensive overview of TAPVC research. Our findings could provide valuable information on the development history, current status, and future trends, as well as new ideas for promoting development in this field.

Data availability

The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Abbreviations

• Total anomalous pulmonary venous connection

Pulmonary vein stenosis

Web of Science core collection

Impact factor

Journal Citation Report

Gross national product

Research & development

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Wen, C., Shen, G., Fang, C. et al. Insight into the research history and trends of total anomalous pulmonary venous connection: a bibliometric analysis. J Cardiothorac Surg 19 , 285 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13019-024-02787-8

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There have been previous studies and earlier systematic review on the relationship between inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and radiation exposure. With the diversification of current test methods, this study intended to conduct a meta-analysis to evaluate the IBD radiation exposure in recent years.

Three databases (PUBMED, EMBASE, and MEDICINE) for relevant literature up to May 1, 2023 were searched. The statistical data meeting requirements were collated and extracted.

20 papers were enrolled. The overall high radiation exposure rate was 15% (95% CI = [12%, 19%]) for CD and 5% (95% CI = [3%, 7%]) for UC. The pooled result found that high radiation exposure rate was 3.44 times higher in CD than in UC (OR = 3.44, 95% CI = [2.35, 5.02]). Moreover, the average radiation exposure level in CD was 12.77 mSv higher than that in UC (WMD = 12.77, 95% CI = [9.93, 15.62] mSv). Furthermore, radiation exposure level of CD after 2012 was higher than those before 2012 (26.42 ± 39.61vs. 23.76 ± 38.46 mSv, P  = 0.016), while UC did not show similar result (11.99 ± 27.66 vs. 10.01 ± 30.76 mSv, P  = 0.1). Through subgroup analysis, it was found that disease duration (WMD = 2.75, 95% CI = [0.10, 5.40] mSv), complications (OR = 5.09, 95% CI = [1.50, 17.29]), and surgical history (OR = 5.46, 95% CI = [1.51, 19.69]) significantly increased the proportion of high radiation exposure.

This study found that radiation exposure level of IBD patients was high, which revealed the radiation risk in the process of diagnosis and treatment of IBD patients. In the future, longer follow-up and prospective studies are needed to reveal the relationship between high radiation exposure and solid tumorigenesis.

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Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), including Crohn’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC), refers to a group of lifelong idiopathic disorders characterized by gastrointestinal inflammation and extra-intestinal manifestations [ 1 ]. The incidence and prevalence of IBD is increasing worldwide especially in Asia, while it is still highest among developed countries in Europe and America [ 2 ]. Due to the unclear pathogenesis and the complexity of treatment, IBD has a significant disease and economic burden [ 3 ]. The diagnosis of IBD is a difficult and complicated process. In addition to gastrointestinal endoscopy, repeated imaging tests are also required, especially for the diagnosis of CD, which needs to assess the extent and severity of the disease, and the presence of complications [ 4 ]. Therefore, the assessment of radiation exposure is very important.

IBD itself increases the risk of intestinal tumors [ 5 , 6 ], and the use of drugs such as azathioprine, other immunosuppressive agents and biological agents will increase the risk of malignant tumors such as lymphoma [ 7 ]. In addition, exposure to ionizing radiation may potentially increase the risk of malignancy [ 8 ]. Radiation exposure as low as 50 millisieverts (mSv) has been associated with the development of certain solid tumors such as colon, bladder cancer [ 9 ]. Globally, up to 2% of malignancies can be attributed to diagnostic medical radiation (DMR) [ 10 ]. Although some clinicians believe that DMR exposure is indeed a potential risk, the actual exposure of IBD patients in clinical practice still lacks sufficient multicenter large sample data to support, that leads to many concerns for patients, such as whether they are exposed to excessive DMR. Previous meta-analysis study have shown that IBD patients do have higher DMR [ 11 ]. With the continuous development of medical technology, such as the application of MRI and intestinal ultrasound, it is not clear whether DMR has changed from before.

Therefore, it is important to conduct this study to update our current knowledge by meta-analysis to analyze relevant studies found to date, especially recent studies, to determine the pooled prevalence of increased exposure in IBD patients and risk factors associated with exposure to potentially harmful ionizing levels.

Data selection

We searched three databases (PUBMED, EMBASE, and MEDICINE) for relevant literature up to May 1, 2023. Literature search limited to human studies and English version, including prospective and retrospective studies. The following search terms were used to retrieve potential articles: ((Inflammatory Bowel Disease) OR (IBD) OR (Crohn’s disease) OR (CD) OR (ulcerative colitis) OR (UC)) AND ((radiation exposure) OR (radiation injuries) OR (medical radiation)).

The search was independently performed by 2 authors according to title and abstract, and full text was retrieved if it met the requirement. In addition, disagreement would be evaluated by a third author independently.

Inclusion criteria and quality assessment

The diagnosis of IBD was based on symptoms, imaging, and histopathology [ 12 ]. High diagnostic medical radiation exposure was defined as ≥ 50 mSv. In addition, sufficient data for calculation were needed for inclusion in the study. STROBE checklist was used to assess Quality assessment and risk of bias for the studies included [ 13 ]. Moreover, the work was conducted in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement [ 14 ].

Data extraction

Relevant data from every included study according to the unified standard were extracted by two independent authors and then they proceeded to cross-check the results. The extracted data contained author, country or region, published year, number of subjects, radiation exposure dose, number of high diagnostic medical radiation exposure and factors affecting radiation exposure. Agreement between the investigators was greater than 95%, and differences between the datasets were resolved by discussion.

Statistical analysis

Continuous variables were expressed as mean and standard deviation, and dichotomous variables were described by odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI). Heterogeneity of the data was quantified with the I 2 statistic and assessed by Cochran’s Q statistic. In this study, when heterogeneity was less than 50%, the pooled estimates were obtained using the fixed-model (Mantel and Haenszel) method. On the contrary, the random-model (M-H heterology) method was chosen if heterogeneity was more than 50% [ 15 ]. This study compared the following: difference in radiation exposure between CD and UC; difference in high diagnostic medical radiation exposure between CD and UC; difference in radiation exposure of CD and UC patients before and after 2012 (According to the articles, it can be basically determined that articles after 2012 did not overlap the count of CT before), and the difference in radiation exposure under different influencing factors including disease duration, gender, complications, surgical history and medication. In addition, sensitivity analysis was used to evaluate whether the results were reliable. Begg’s test was conducted to estimate publication bias with a value of P  > 0.05 suggesting no publication bias. All data analysis methods involved in this study were implemented through STATA 15 (StataCorp., College Station, Tex, USA).

Basic characteristics

A total of 3894 relevant articles were screened, of which 20 papers were enrolled finally according to inclusion criteria. The flowchart has been schematically outlined in Fig.  1 which described the process of the study selection. 20 articles all referred to CD, and 15 of them referred to radiation exposure of UC. The included population of 17 articles came from Europe and the United States. Of the 20 articles reporting on CD, 17 mentioned average radiation exposure values, 16 mentioned numbers of high diagnostic medical radiation exposure, and 13 articles were published after 2012. Of the 15 articles reporting on UC, 13 mentioned average radiation exposure values, 12 mentioned numbers of high diagnostic medical radiation exposure, and 9 articles were published after 2012. UC did not perform subgroup analysis on influencing factors due to lack of literature support. About CD, 3 referred to disease duration, 3 referred to gender, 3 referred to complications, 4 referred to surgical history, and 3 referred to medication.

Flowchart of articles selected

Radiation exposure in CD and UC patients

The total number and number of individuals with high radiation exposure of CD was 32,963 and 5181 respectively, and the average radiation exposure level was 26.31 mSv (Table  1 ). At the same time, The total number and number of individuals with high radiation exposure of UC was 34,854 and 2147 respectively, and the average radiation exposure level was 11.97 mSv (Table  2 ). Combining rates by meta-analysis found that the overall high radiation exposure rate was 15% (95% CI = [12%, 19%]) for CD (Fig.  2 A) and 5% (95% CI = [3%, 7%]) for UC (Fig.  2 B). The pooled result of meta-analysis found that high radiation exposure rate was 3.44 times higher in CD than in UC (OR = 3.44, 95% CI = [2.35, 5.02]) (Fig.  3 A). Moreover, the pooled results of meta-analysis showed that the average radiation exposure level in CD was 12.77 mSv higher than that in UC (WMD = 12.77, 95% CI = [9.93, 15.62] mSv) (Fig.  3 B).

Forest plot showed event rate defined as proportion of patients exposed to high diagnostic medical radiation exposure ≥ 50 mSv in CD and UC patients

Forest plot showed the difference between radiation exposure level and high radiation exposure odds ratios between CD and UC

Furthermore, we compared whether there was a difference in radiation exposure level before and after 2012 in order to judge whether the increase in imaging methods in recent years has affected radiation exposure. 11 articles on CD were published after 2012, while 6 articles were published before 2012 (Table  1 ). The pooled radiation exposure level was 26.42 ± 39.61 mSv after 2012 and 23.76 ± 38.46 mSv before 2012, and there was a statistical difference between two groups ( P  = 0.016). In addition, high radiation exposure rate was 16.10% after 2012 and 12.25% before 2012, and it also had statistical difference ( P  < 0.01). However, UC did not show similar results. 8 articles were published after 2012, while 5 articles were published before 2012 (Table  2 ). The pooled radiation exposure level was 11.99 ± 27.66 mSv after 2012 and 10.01 ± 30.76 mSv before 2012, and high radiation exposure rate was 6.64% after 2012 and 4.30% before 2012. Neither parameter had statistical difference ( P  = 0.1 and P  = 0.62, respectively).

Finally, the study analyzed factors affecting radiation exposure. Due to lack of data, we only analyzed the influencing factors of CD. Disease duration, gender, complications, surgical history, and medication were the factors for our analysis. Through subgroup analysis, it was found that disease duration (WMD = 2.75, 95% CI = [0.10, 5.40] mSv), complications (OR = 5.09, 95% CI = [1.50, 17.29]), and surgical history (OR = 5.46, 95% CI = [1.51, 19.69]) significantly increased the proportion of high radiation exposure, while gender (OR = 1.16, 95% CI = [0.76, 1.77]) and medication (OR = 1.75, 95% CI = [0.99, 3.11]) had no effect. (Fig.  4 )

Forest plot showed odds ratio of risk factors of high radiation exposure grouped according to exposure

Funnel plot analyses of studies assessing radiation exposure revealed no significant publication bias ( P  > 0.05). Sensitivity analysis showed that although some results were fluctuant, the overall results were stable and reliable.

This updated meta-analysis showed that radiation exposure of IBD patients was significantly increased, and the proportion of patients with high radiation exposure was also significantly increased. In addition, radiation exposure level of CD patients was significantly higher than that of UC patients, and the high radiation exposure of CD was related to disease duration, complications and surgical history.

Radiation exposure in IBD patients was significantly higher, which was depended on the course of diagnosis and treatment of the disease. Especially for CD patients, because the entire digestive tract may be involved, doctors need to conduct a comprehensive evaluation, especially the evaluation of the small intestine, which requires the use of small intestine CT and abdominal CT. It reported that incidence and mortality of solid cancer were positively associated with higher radiation dose and younger age of exposure [ 16 ]. And it has been reported that ionising radiation levels as low as 50 mSv have been contributed to the development of solid tumors [ 9 ]. Based on the results of this study and the characteristics of IBD patients with young age of onset and high radiation exposure [ 17 ], we believed that IBD patients may be exposed to an environment with a higher tumor incidence. So what can be done to reduce the risk of solid tumors in patients with IBD? First, we could propose the creation of an IBD patient radiation diary to record total radiation exposure and increase physician awareness of patient exposure to ionizing radiation [ 18 ]. Second, in tertiary care institutions, the frequency of magnetic resonance enterography (MRE) examinations can be increased to replace CT enterography (CTE). MRE is used to obtain cross-sectional imaging of small bowel without exposure to DMR, which can show the inflammation and fibrotic bowel wall in detail [ 19 ]. In a prospective study, Fiorino et al. found that MRE and CTE were similar accuracy in localizing CD, bowel wall enhancement, enteroenteric fistula, and MRE was superior to CTE for assessing strictures and bowel wall thickening [ 20 ]. Therefore, European Crohn’s and Colitis Organisation advocate increased routine usage of MRI for the assessment of small bowel CD [ 21 ]. According to the results of this study, why do the articles published in recent years showed that radiation exposure dose of IBD was higher than before. The authors believed that there were many reasons for this. First, the popularity of MRE is still only available in large general hospitals. Therefore, CTE remains the primary usage of IBD examination. Second, with the tense medical environment, doctors are more careful to deal with complications that may occur at any time during the diagnosis and treatment of patients and pay more attention to the efficacy of patients, so the frequency of examinations may be increased. Finally, Although the article was published in recent years, the patients included in the article may go back several years.

The results of this study showed that disease duration, complications and surgical history were associated with high radiation exposure, which was clearly closely related to the diagnosis and follow-up of the disease. The earlier the onset, the earlier the initial exposure. In addition, complications and surgical history have also added additional imaging tests to assess the severity of the disease. CT imaging offers advantages of rapid acquisition of images, high sensitivity, widespread availability, and specificity for the detection of intestinal and extra-intestinal disease [ 22 ]. Combined with the improved visualization of the small bowel mucosa by CTE, the assessment of small bowel disease activity is more accurate [ 23 ]. However, previous studies have shown that the role of CT in assessing intestinal disease activity may be limited [ 24 ]. In turn, radiation-induced cancer occurs in 1/1000 patients who undergo at least10 mSv CT scan [ 25 ]. Therefore, the appropriate imaging examination methods and frequency in the process of IBD diagnosis and treatment still require doctors to pay close attention.

On the basis of previous studies, this study has carried out a more detailed and systematic study and obtained more convincing results, but there were still some shortcomings needed to be pointed out. First, this study included data from multiple centers, which can lead to patient heterogeneity. Although sensitivity analysis showed the overall results were stable and reliable, the existence of heterogeneity still made this study only select random effect model for data analysis. The inconsistency of equipment models in different centers, the inconsistency of doctors’ cognition of diseases, and the compliance of patients would all affect the total radiation exposure. Moreover, this study has conducted extensive screening of papers. But based on the data provided by the published papers, the data of some included papers was not complete. We also asked the authors about the data through email, but unfortunately there was no reply. Additionally, the estimated radiation dose may be greater or less than the actual exposure. It is also possible that tests performed at other centers may not have been captured, leading to underestimate the total radiation dose. Second, we lacked studies with large sample data. Some studies included limited patients, which affected the reliability of the results. In particular, in the subgroup analysis of high exposure risk factors, the number of articles and patients included was limited, so the reliability of the results was limited. Finally, we lacked longer-term follow-up and prospective studies to analyze the risk of solid tumor development in high radiation exposure patients. The emergence of such results will have important guiding significance for the selection of imaging examinations in the process of IBD diagnosis and treatment.

In conclusion, this study found that radiation exposure level of IBD patients was high, and exposure level of CD patients was higher than UC, which revealed the radiation risk in the process of diagnosis and treatment of IBD patients. In the future, longer follow-up and prospective studies are needed to reveal the relationship between high radiation exposure and solid tumorigenesis.

Data availability

The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Abbreviations

• Inflammatory bowel disease
• Crohn’s disease
• Ulcerative colitis

Diagnostic medical radiation

Millisieverts

Confidence interval

Magnetic resonance enterography

CT enterography

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Lu, C., Yao, X., Yu, M. et al. Medical radiation exposure in inflammatory bowel disease: an updated meta-analysis. BMC Gastroenterol 24 , 173 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12876-024-03264-1

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Received : 09 October 2023

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DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s12876-024-03264-1

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